GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE.

Vol. XXXVII.      November, 1850.      No. 5.

Table of Contents

Fiction, Literature and Articles

Poetry, Music, and Fashion

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

THE ANGEL’S WHISPER.

GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE.

Vol. XXXVII.     PHILADELPHIA, November, 1850.     No. 5.

The mythologies, in which the faiths, philosophies and fancies of the world have taken form, have such truth and use in them that they endure, under corresponding changes, through the reformations of creeds and modifications of ceremony which mark the history of natural religion throughout all ages and countries. The essential unity of the race, its kindred constitution of mind and affections, its likeness of instincts, passions and aspirations, naturally account for the under-lying agreement in principles, and central similarity of beliefs, which are traceable clean through, from the earliest to the most modern, and from the most polished and elaborate eastern to the rudest northern opinions; and the nice transitions of doctrine from the infancy to the maturity of faith and philosophy, are marked by an answering variance in their significant ceremonials. But, however mingled and marred, the inevitable truth is imbedded in all the forms of fable, and, under an invariable law of mind, the inspirations of fancy correspond in essentials to the oracles of revelation, just because human nature is one, and its relations to all truth are fixed and universal.

Creeds and formulæ, like the geological crusts of the earth, at once retain and record the revolutions, disintegrations, intrusions and submersions from which they result. In the long succession of epochs whole continents have risen from the deep, and the vestiges of the most ancient ocean are found upon the modern mountain tops; promontories have been slowly washed away by the ceaseless waves, and new islands have shot up from the ever-heaving sea. Through the more recent crusts the primitive formations frequently crop out upon the surface of the present, and the comparatively modern, in turn, is often found fossilized beneath the most ancient; dislocated fragments are encountered at every step, and icebergs, from the severer latitudes, are found floating far into the tropical seas. Nevertheless, through all changes of system, revolution has been ever in the same round of celestial influences and relations, and the alterations of form and structure have been only so many different mixtures of unchanging elements, from the simple primitives to the rich composite moulds, into which the waters, winds and sun-light have, in the lapse of ages, modified them. The constancy of essential principles, through all mutations of systematic dogmas, is strikingly analagous. The law of adaptation links the material globe and the rational race which occupies it in intimate relations, and the universal unity in the great scheme of being establishes such correspondences of organisms and processes with ideas and ends, that the symbolisms of poetry and mythology are really well based in the truth of nature, and the essential harmonies of all things are with equal truth, under various forms, embraced by fiction and fact, fable and faith, superstition and enlightened reason.

“The true light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world;” “the grace that hath appeared unto all men;” and “the invisible things of the Creator, clearly seen and understood by the things which are made,” are propositions which have the formal warrant of our sacred books to back the authority of logical demonstration. Moreover, it is pleasant and profitable to believe that “He hath not left himself without a witness” among any of the tribes of men. The human brotherhood is so involved in the divine fatherhood, that the individual’s hold on the infinite and eternal must stand or fall with the universality of His regards and providence. If Canaan had been without a “Prophet of the Most High,” if Chaldea had been left without soothsayer and seer, and classic Greece and Rome destitute of oracles and Sibylline revelations, the Jewish theology and the Christian apocalypse would stand unsupported by “the analogy of faith,” and our highest hopes would be shifted from the broad basis of an impartial benevolence, to a narrow caprice of the “Father of all Men.” But, happily, the sympathies of nature, the deductions of reason, and the teachings of the Book, are harmonious on this point, for we find Melchisedec, who could claim no legal or lineal relation to the Levitical priesthood, the chosen type of the perpetual “High Priest of our profession;” and Balaam, notwithstanding his heathen birth, and ministry among the Canaanites when their cup of iniquity was full; and the eastern Magi, who brought their gifts from afar among the Gentiles, to the new-born “King of the Jews,” all alike guided by the same light, and partakers and fellow-laborers in the same faith, with the regular hierarchy of Mount Zion. So, the Star of Jacob is the “desire of nations,” and the heart and hope of the wide world turneth ever toward the same essential truth, and strive after it by the same instinct through a thousand forms, “if haply they may find it.”

The religious system of the Jews and Chaldeans agreed, with wonderful exactness, in the doctrine of angelic beings and their interposition in the affairs of men. The superintendence of the destinies of nations and individuals, and the allotment of provinces, kingdoms and families among these ministering spirits, are as distinctly taught in the book of Daniel of the old testament, and in the gospel of St. Matthew of the new, as in the popular beliefs of the Arabians and Persians; indeed, the Bible sanction is general, particular, and ample, for the doctrine of angelic ministry as it has been held in all ages and throughout the world.

The order and organization of these celestial beings, among whom the infinite multiplicity of providential offices is thus distributed, falling within the domain of marvelousness and ideality, of course, took the thousand hues and shapes which these prismatic faculties would bestow; and in the various accommodations and special applications of the doctrine, it naturally grew complicated, obscure, and sometimes even incoherent; but in all the confusion of a hundred tongues, kindreds and climates, a substantial conformity to a common standard is apparent enough to prove the identity of origin and the fundamental truth common to them all.

It is to introduce one of these remarkable correspondences that these reflections are employed.

Fairy tales, it is said by encyclopedists, were brought from Arabia into France in the twelfth century, but this can only mean that that was the epoch of the exotic legends. In England, if they were not indigenous, they certainly were naturalized centuries before Chaucer flourished; and they were as familiar as the catechism, and almost as orthodox, when Spencer, wrote his Fairy Queen, and Shakspeare employed their agency in his most exquisite dramas. But their date is, in fact, coeval with tradition, and earlier than all written records, and their origin is without any necessary locality, for they spring spontaneously from faith in the supernatural. They are inseparable from poetry. The priesthood of nature, which enters for us the presence of the invisible and converses familiarly with the omnipresent life of the creation, recognizes the administration of an ethereal hierarchy in all the phenomena of existence; they serve to impersonate the spiritual forces, which are felt in all heroic action, and they graduate the responsive sympathies of Heaven to all the supernatural necessities of humanity. The live soul can make nothing dead; it can take no relation to insensate matter; it invests the universe with a conscious life, answering to its own; and an infinite multitude of intermediate spirits stand to its conceptions for the springs of the universal movement. Rank upon rank, in spiral ascent, the varied ministry towers from earth to heaven, answering to every need, supporting every hope, and environing the whole life of the individual and the race with an adjusted providence, complete and adequate. In the great scale, place and office are assigned for spirits celestial, ethereal and terrestrial, in almost infinite gradation. The highest religious sentiments, the noblest styles of intellect and imagination, and the lower and coarser apprehensions of the invisible orders of being, are all met and indulged by the accommodating facility of the system.

The race of Peris of Persia, and Fairies of western Europe, hold a very near and familiar relation to the every day life of humanity, by their large intermixture of human characteristics and the close resemblance and alliance of their probationary existence and ultimate destiny to the life and fortunes of men. A commonplace connection with ordinary affairs and household interests constitutes the largest part of the popular notion of them; and their interferences among the vulgar are almost absurd and ludicrous enough to impeach the earnestness of the superstition; but our best poets have shown them capable of very noble and beneficent functions in heroic story. Like our own various nature, they are a marvellous mixture of the mighty and the mean, the magnanimous, the malignant and the mirthful; they stand, in a word, as our own correspondents in a subtler sphere, and serve to illustrate, by exaggerating, all that is true and possible in us, but more probable of them—our own shadows lengthened, and our own light brightened into a higher life. In some countries the legends are obscure, in others clear; but they all agree well enough in ascribing their origin to the intermarriage of angels with “the daughters of men,” and that they are put under penance and probation for the recovery of their paradise. So, like our own race, they have fallen from a higher estate; their natures are half human, and their general fortunes are freighted on the same tide.

The nursery tale of the Sleeping Beauty will serve capitally to illustrate our theme. Handed down from age to age, and passed from nation to nation, through the agency of oral tradition chiefly, it has of course taken as many shapes as the popular fancy could impart to it; but the essential points, seen through all the existing forms, are substantially these:

A grand coronation festival of a young queen abruptly opens the story. The state room of the palace is furnished with Oriental magnificence. The representatives of every order, interest and class in the kingdom—constructively the whole community—are present to witness and grace the scene. The fairies who preside over the various departments of nature, and the functions and interests of society, are assembled by special invitation to invoke the blessings and pledge the favors of their several jurisdictions to the opening reign. The ceremony proceeds; the young queen is crowned; the priest pronounces the benediction, and the generous sprites bestow beauty and goodness, and every means of life and luxury, until nothing is left for imagination to conceive or heart to wish. But an unexpected and unwelcome guest arrives—an old Elf, of jealous and malignant character, whose intrusion cannot be prevented, and whose power, unhappily, is so great, that the whole tribe of amicable spirits cannot unbind her spells. Neither can she directly revoke their beneficences; for such is the constitution of fairy-land that the good and evil can neither annihilate each other’s powers nor check each other’s actions, and their active antagonism can have place and play only in issues and effects. The good commanded and dispensed cannot be utterly annulled, the profusion of blessings prepared and pledged cannot be hindered in their source or interrupted in their flow, but the recipients are the debatable ground; they are, within certain limits, subject to the control of the demon, and the end is as well attained by striking them incapable of the intended good. The queen and her household are cast into a magic slumber until (for the Evil will be ultimately destroyed by the Good) an age shall elapse and bring a Deliverer, who, through virtue and courage, shall dissolve the infernal charm. The blight fell upon the paradise in its full bloom, and it remained only for the youngest fairy present, who had withheld her benefactions to the last, to mitigate the doom she could not avert, by bestowing pleasant dreams upon the long and heavy sleepers. A century rolls round. The Knight of the Lion undertakes the enterprise; encounters the horrible troops of monsters and foul fiends which guard the palace; overcomes them; enters the enchanted hall, and wakens the whole company to life, liberty and joy again. The knight is, of course, rewarded with the love he so well deserves and the hand he has so richly earned.

This is obviously the story of the apostacy and redemption of the human family, in the form of a fairy legend. It conforms closely to the necessary incidents of such a catastrophe, and answers well and truly to the intuitive prophecy of man’s final recovery. In substance and method the correspondence is obvious. Every notion of “the fall,” whether revealed or fictitious, assumes the agency of “the wicked one;” and the final recovery, universally expected, involves the sympathies and employs the services of the “ministering spirits,” as important instruments in the happy consummation.

This tale was presented as a dramatic spectacle last winter at the Boston Museum. The play is a minutely faithful expositor of the legend; and it is by the aid of this fine scenic exhibition that I am able to adjust the details, of which the primitive story is so legitimately capable, to the answering points in the great epic of human history “as it is most surely believed among us.” The parallel presented does not seem to me fanciful, but the circumstantial exactness of resemblance may, I think, be accounted for without supposing a designed imitation.

Before tracing the specialties and their allusions, let us notice the general parallelism found between the pivotal points of the fabulous and authentic representations.

The Bible Eden is introduced at the same stage of the story’s action and in the same attitude to the principal characters of the narrative; it stands on the coronation day of its monarch, perfect in all its appointments; the realms of air, earth and ocean in auspicious relation, every element harmoniously obedient, and the garden still glows with the smile which accompanied the approving declaration, “it is very good.” Dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the face of the earth, is conferred, and the heavens add their felicities to the inaugural rejoicings—“the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy.” The gifts are without measure or stint, and the Divine beneficence cannot be tainted in its source nor impeded in its efflux, but the intended recipients, by “the wiles of the enemy,” are rendered incapable of the enjoyment. The sin-blunted sense and passion blinded soul of the fallen race, are plunged into a spiritual stupor, which sleep—the sister and semblance of death—strikingly illustrates; and through the long age of moral incapacity which follows, the highest mode of life is but dimly recognized and feebly felt in the dreams of a paradise lost and the visions of a millenium to come; till, “in the fullness of time,” when a complete psychical age shall be past. The Deliverer, having first overcome the wicked one, shall lead captivity captive, and by the “marriage of the Lamb” with “the bride which is the Church,” perfect the redemption and bring in the new heavens and new earth.

But to the fable, the dramatic representation and the interpretation thereof.

The scene opens upon a rustic society, a hamlet, in the infancy of civilization, such as, upon ballad authority, was “merrie England” before the age of her conquests in arts, sciences and arms, and before the crimes and cares of her age of glory replaced the days of her innocence and contentment. Simplicity of manners, modest abundance, moderate labor, aspirations limited to the range of things easy of attainment, and opinions comfortably at rest on questions of policy and religion, describe the rural life upon Monsieur Bonvive’s domain. The master, in bachelor ease, superintends the simple affairs of his village; Madam Babillard, the house-keeper, has the necessary excitement without the anxiety of her post—just the amount of trouble that is interesting with the pigs, poultry and pets of the homestead. The girls, indeed, are too hasty in ripening into womanhood, and the beaux are over-bold in their gallantries; but then, these are things of great consequence to her, and she is, through them, a matter of great consequence to the community, and the exercise of authority amply repays all its troubles and responsibilities. The affairs of the commonwealth take good enough care of themselves generally; the people are happy in the enjoyment of what they have, and equally happy in the unconsciousness of what they have not; the holydays come at least once a-week, and there is space and place for work and play every hour of every day. Good consciences, light hearts, and natural living, carry them along very happily, and they have enough of the little risks and changes of fortune to keep the life within them well alive. The wilderness upon which their village borders is known to be infested with hobgoblins and demons, and there is a current belief that in the centre of the forest there is a princely family bound in a spell for a hundred years, but they have never penetrated the mystery nor clearly ascertained the facts.

Among these simple people there is an ancient dame, who was old when the oldest villager first knew her, and she has lived through all the known generations of men. Her whole life has been a continual exercise of the best offices among the people; she has been nurse and doctress, friend and counselor, by turns, to the whole community, and they repay her with the love and veneration which her goodness and wisdom command. She is now apparently in the decrepitude of extreme age, but the frame only assumes the marks of age—the mind is as young and the affections as fresh as they were “a hundred years ago.” She is the “Fairy of the Oak,”—the youngest at the coronation scene, and the tutelary spirit of the enchanted family. Ever since the hour of their evil fortunes she has inhabited a human form, performing the charitable offices of ordinary life and mitigating its incident evils; but, especially she has been cultivating whatever of virtuous enterprise and aspiration appeared among the youth from generation to generation, directing it into the best service and endeavoring by it the deliverance of the imprisoned spirits under her charge. Patiently and lovingly she has striven, earnestly and anxiously she has watched, every promise of a deliverance that the race from age to age produced. Patriarch, prophet, apostle and philanthropist, has each in his degree done his own good work, and the world has been the better that they lived; each has added another assurance of the ultimate success, but themselves “have died without the sight.” Her own powers, and those of her auxiliaries, are vast and supernatural, indeed, but the champion age of human redemption must be human, and she can but inspire, direct, sustain and guard the mighty effort.

Now, a young Christian Knight “the Knight of the Lion,” famous for deeds of valor in Holy Land, gives promise of the great achievement to the quick perception of the Guardian Spirit. She has aroused his enthusiasm and sustained his zeal, disciplining him by trial after trial, and training him from triumph to triumph, for still greater deeds, which take continually more definite shape and more attractive forms in the dreams and reveries which she inspires, until he has grown familiar with the vision and conscious of its supernatural suggestion, and she is able at last to intimate the duty and the trial which invite him by songs in the air addressed to his waking ear.

Drawn westward by her art toward the scene of the great enterprise, he reaches the village on the border of the wilderness, and from the legend current among the rustics inferring more definitely the character of his mission, he accepts it in the true chivalric spirit of faith, love and hope. His squire, or man-at-arms, who has followed him heretofore with an unquestioning fidelity, consents to incur the risks, though he has a very imperfect apprehension of the heroic undertaking; but the devotion of a faithful follower answers instead of knowledge in his rank of service. He would rather encounter a dozen flesh and blood swordsmen than one ghostly foe; nevertheless, where his master leads he will follow, whatever the character of the fight. The knight comprehends the nature of the conflict fully; it is not with flesh and blood, but with “spiritual wickedness in high places” that he “has his warfare.” To him the great battle is not in the outward and actual, but is transferred to the inward and spiritual sphere—into the real life—whence the ultimate facts of existence derive all their currents and ends. So felt the hero who said, in the great faith, “we have our conversation in heaven”—“we sit in heavenly places;” and so felt and thought the reformer who deliberately threw his ink-stand at the devils’ head. The region of the ideal is the fields of the highest heroism, and every life given to the world in noble service and generous sacrifice is living in the spirit sphere in familiar sympathy with the good, and constant strife with evil angels. This faith is the main impulse in all chivalric action; even a heroic poem cannot be created without it. It cannot be false, for it differs nothing in the constancy and efficiency of its presence from the most palpable facts, and is proved true by the test of harmonizing with all other truth.

The knight personates the highest ideal of philanthropy; the squire stands for the lower, more palpable modes of practical benevolence and reform. They are distinguished as widely as general and special providence, as the thorough emancipation of the soul and the charity which relieves the body, or the whole difference between the apostleship of spiritual and that of civil liberty. They correspond respectively to the Prophet Elisha, who saw the mountain tops filled with horses and chariots of fire, outnumbering and overwhelming the hosts of the Syrian king; and his servant, who saw but two men, his master and himself, opposed to a numerous and well appointed army. Such is the difference between the seer and the servant in any labor or conflict of faith—in any enterprise which involves the spiritual forces that rule the movements of the world. Throughout the whole action of the drama the agency and deportment of the knight and his follower are marked by this distinction. But the scene shifts, and the sympathetic and corroborative movements in Fairy-land, are revealed. The Fairy of the Oak appears and summons the spirits of the Air, Earth, Water and Fire. The elements, disordered by the fall, and thenceforth at war with the poor fugitive from Paradise, must render their aid in his restoration, that when the last enemy is put under his feet the material creation, cursed for his sin, may be renewed with his recovery, and the harmonies of matter answer to the sanctities of spirit. The spirits of the material forces obey the invocation, and cordially promise sympathy and service:

The actors, human and ethereal, thus adjusted to their several offices, the knight and his squire enter the haunted wood—the squire to struggle with the grosser forms of evil, some as ludicrous as sad, others as horrible as atrocious, and all odious, coarse and palpable; the knight to be tempted of the devil, and do battle with him for the redemption of the enchanted family from his dominion.

On the open front of the stage, darkened with smoke and foul with offensive odors of noxious gases, the squire is hotly engaged with the great dragon, in close rencontre, and at the same time assailed above, around, in flank and rear, by harpies, fiery serpents, and other forms of terror—the battle of life translated into coarse diablerie. The sentiment and significance of the play in this take great liberties with the regular charities and practical reforms of our social system. The sorts of evil which these monsters so uncouthly represent are such as physical suffering, drunkenness, violence, fraud, and the thousand shapes of slavery, personal and political, and of all castes and colors. They are represented as greedy and ugly, and full of mocking and malignity, but with little intrinsic capability of mischief, for they are really unattractive in temptation and extremely awkward in battle, and much more remarkable for thick-skinned insensibility to assault than for any adroitness in the combat. The squire bravely deals his blows upon the great dragon. Horror, fear and hatred of the monster, earnest devotion to the “great cause,” with the courage of full commitment, and, perhaps, some regard for his reputation as a hard-hitter, put life and metal in his veins, and right lustily he mauls away. The earliest effects of his prowess are remarkable. The dragon, defending his own ground as confidently and angrily as if the empire of evil were really a rightful one wherever sanctioned by antiquity of possession, dashes his ponderous jaws at the reckless agitator, opened wide enough to swallow him, with all his weapons and armor at a gulp; but he manages to elude the clumsy wrath, and, nothing daunted and nothing doubting, deals his blows with energy in the ratio of the rage they rouse. Curiously, but conformably enough, at every stroke another ring of the monster’s tail unrolls. At first he was an unwieldy, but not an utterly misshapen brute; now he has become a serpent and a scarecrow; the head and tail are as incongruous as the pretended righteousness of his cause and his villainous method of defending it. The strife goes on, and grows only the worse and wickeder for its continuance, till it is plain that the beast is not to be mastered with hard blows, and if he yields it is because his huge, unwieldy bulk is exhausted with the protracted effort of defense, and he subsides at last rather than submits. So ends the battle, and then comes the triumph. The valorous victor, claiming all the honors he has won, mounts his sometime foe in the new character of hobby, and rides him grandly off the stage in a blaze of gaseous glory, cheered most vociferously by the boys and affording not a little merriment, mixed with admiration, to the old folks. What a figure that procession made! and how exact a figure, too, of many another that the world witnesses admiringly. The squire is, however, none the less a hero that his principles are rugged, his method rude, his ideas a little vulgar, and his aims tinged but not tainted with his egotism. The dragons, serpents and hobgoblins must be routed, and he is the man for the emergency.

All the while this palpable warfare is proceeding in open view, the knight is engaged with the subtler fiends in the dim and doubtful darkness of the background. Quite behind the scenes the severest strife is maintained, but enough is seen and intimated upon the stage to reveal the real character of the conflict. The fidelity of illustration in the conduct of the allegory here was really admirable. At one time we descried him through the gloom by the flashing of his sword, engaged in hand-to-hand combat with a host of fiends, rushing upon the foe with true chivalric enthusiasm; at another, hard pressed and well-nigh exhausted, sternly enduring the blows he could not parry or repay—exhibiting, in turn, every mood of courage to do and fortitude to endure the varied fortunes of the field. But anon, with equal truthfulness of portraiture, he is discovered trembling in sudden and strange panics, which show the temporary failure of his faith, and seem to threaten his utter desertion of the field. In the open presence of the foe his courage never fails, but the stratagem of darkness and desertion successfully evades the sword-thrust and the shield’s defense, and gives him up to doubt and desperation. The powers of darkness take hold upon him, and in his agonies of fear and suffering he would, if it were possible, that the cup might pass from him. In these moments of anguish and depression the Fairy of the Oak instantly appeared to strengthen him. With a touch and a word she reassures him, and the divine virtue again shines out, exposing visibly the demon of the doubt, and the good sword again flashes in the gloom, and the fiends, forced into open fight, are finally overthrown.

Bulwer strikes the same profound fact of experience in heroic enterprise, in his “Terror of the Threshold.” The reformer, however, confident in virtue and assured of the goodness of his undertaking, naturally trembles at critical stages of revolution in opinions and institutions long established and interwoven with the existing order of society, for the risk of introducing new truths may well check the current of a wise man’s zeal. If I pull down, he will say, this temple whose ceremonial, though barbarous and blinding, yet supports the morals of the worshiper and the present order of the social system, will the liberty and light bestowed avail for the designed improvement, or will they only unsettle the securities of law and prove occasions of disorder and licentiousness? The brave bigot and fiery enthusiast know nothing of this indecision. The cautious hesitation which springs from solicitude for the best ends and most expedient means, never troubles their stubborn bluntness of purpose nor abates their boasted consistency of action. But the regular procedure of Providence is marked by regard for the influence of conditions and the established law of progress. In these things the highest benevolence meets impediments and suffers modifications and even submits to postponement to avoid defeat; and the agents and instruments of the world’s regeneration have their Gethsemanes as well as their triumphs and transfigurations.

Nothing in language, scenery or costume irreverently asserted the allusions which I am exposing. I do not know that either playwright, performer or spectator was concerned about or even conscious of the significant symbolism of the fable and its circumstantial exposition in the play. It was produced as a beautiful dramatic spectacle. Apart from any mystical meanings, it was a perfect luxury of scenic entertainment. It was so regarded by the visiters, and probably was designed for nothing more; but to me the analogy was a surprise and a delight, growing at every step of the development. It struck me first when I saw the knight and his brave squire standing on the threshold of the enchanted hall, after their victory in the wilderness. With equal zeal, truthfulness and devotion they had battled with the formidable foe, but with very different aims and apprehensions. The difference was most manifest when they stood in the presence of the enchanted family. The knight, breathless with awe and melting with compassion, showed how tenderly and reverently he felt the moral and mental bondage which struck his opened vision; but the squire, though so faithful and loyal as a follower, and efficient as a servant, had yet not the penetration of a seer; and the preposterous spectacle of princes, counselors, knights, esquires, priests, soldiers, pages, artisans, musicians, dancers, slaves, retainers—every class and calling among men—all arrested in mid-action, and slumbering for a century amid the luxury and pageantry of a gorgeous festival, with the viands untasted and the cup undrained before them, struck him with a comic wonder and pleasant sportiveness which he cared not to suppress. Approaching the venerable prime minister of the realm, who sat with the goblet near his lip, immovable as death, the thirsty soldier familiarly proposed to drink his health, and only made mouths at the cup when he found it “as dry as dust.” The cheek of the dancing girl, who stood pivoted for her century upon one toe, he found “as cold as a stone;” and the apples offered by an African slave to a guest, whose hand hung arrested midway in the reach, proved to his disappointed taste a petrified humbug. The whole scene of deprivation and incapacity before him he pronounced an epidemic sleeping fever, and he wondered if it was catching, and where and how he should get his dinner!

All this has its parallel and exposition in the boys that mock a drunkard reeling through the street, and the contrasted sadness which a soul alive to the moral ruin feels at the same sight; or it may be witnessed again in the conduct of an insensible boor and that of a person of refinement in the presence of the insane; and in general, in the sentiments of those who have, and those who have not, learned that “the life is more than meat, and the body than raiment.”

These reflections present themselves in the pause while the champion stands, riveted with emotions of wonder and pity at the mingled gloom and glory of the scene.

But the action proceeds again. A strain of melody spontaneously waking from the silence of an age, fitly preludes and prophesies the harmonies of the new era, and there wants only the taliha-cumi of the Deliverer to awaken the princess and her household into the activities of full life. At the bidding of the minstrel he advances to her pavilion. Answering to his word and touch, she rises. One by one the women first resume their proper consciousness, and the revival of the men follows in proper order, till the spell is broken and the last shadow of the long night gives place to the perfect day. The renovated realm every where receives its primal beauty, the flowers of Eden bloom again, and the fruits regain their flavor, the wine is new in the new kingdom, and all the material ministries of life without, respond to the renewed faculties within.

The fable has not yet exhausted the facts. Obeying the poetical necessities of the epic story, and conforming also to the apocalyptic vision of the world’s fortunes, which are to follow the first victory over the dragon and the binding of the adversary for a thousand years, we have the peace and happiness of the disenchanted household once more disturbed. The prince of the powers of darkness, that great magician who is the author of all the mischief from the beginning, is “loosed out of his prison,” and gathering all his forces for a final battle, he surrounds the castle. The queen’s army, led by the knight, go out to meet the grand enemy in battle, and he is utterly overthrown and his power broken for ever. The conquerors return in triumph to the castle, and in the midst of their rejoicings a herald from the outer wall, who has witnessed the scene, announces the total annihilation of the enemy. The elements, marshaled by their ruling spirits, have overwhelmed him; a tempest of hail and fire bursts upon his castle, and the earth opening has swallowed up the last vestige of his kingdom and power.

The battle of Gog and Magog (20th Rev.) in which the deceived of the four quarters of the earth are gathered together, and compass the camp of the saints about, is the very prototype of this incident in our story, and “the fire which came down from heaven,” and the “casting of the devil which deceived them into the lake of fire and brimstone,” is only a different expression of the same final deliverance of the human family from the last enemy.

The marriage rites close and crown the grand achievement, and a magnificent tableau illustrates the consummation. The spirits of the elements arise, and array themselves in a vertical arch upon the stage. The centre and summit is occupied by a new figure, now first introduced, costumed appropriately in pure white, representing Truth in augurated or universal harmony; the Spirit of Earth at the base on one side, and of Water at the other, while impersonations of Air and Fire occupy the intermediate positions. This bow of beauty and promise, emblematically dressed and decorated, stood a happy symbol of the restored order of the material creation. The household, artistically arranged and displayed, represented the divine order of society, where government and liberty, refinement and efficiency, luxury and industry, are reconciled, and man with his fellow man is organized in the harmonies of the creative scheme. And, that the joy may be full to the utmost limits of communion and sympathy, the Fairy of the Oak is seen ascending, to take possession, in behalf of her race, of their recovered heaven—the guerdon of their services to the redeemed family of Adam. So, the last scene in the drama mingles the new Heavens with the new Earth, and all the worlds in our universe triumph together in the general resurrection, as they rejoiced on the birth-day of the creation.

I do not know the history of the fairy tale, its age or origin. I know nothing of the design with which it was prepared for theatrical representation, nor do I see why it should be inferred, because the idea and method are so strikingly significant, that the manager, after the fashion of the ancient “Mysteries,” intended to restore sacred subjects to the stage in allegorical disguise. I suppose that the fable is simply fancy’s method of the great fact, and that its doctrinals are the natural intuitives and inevitable theory of the human mind concerning the mystery of life, the great epochal experiences of the human family, their final fortunes, and the interests and sympathies of other worlds included; for such conceptions as these are general and common among all men. The question of special revelation is not affected by its concurrence with universally received ideas. The correspondence pervading all systems proves the truth and unity of origin of the essential points in all, but in no wise touches the method of their revealment, discovery or propagation.

The points and particulars of the play are none of them manufactured to supply the running parallel we have given, nor are they nearly exhausted. Moreover, it will readily occur that the plan of the play illustrates the whole philosophy of world-mending by its merely human hero. The actual and eventual progress of civilization, religion and liberty can be laid down upon its scheme in the exactest detail of principles, which facts must follow and fulfill. The supernatural agencies introduced also answer this aspect and rendering of the myth. They well represent the material and immaterial forces concerned in all societary movements, and if they may not serve for the religion of the great process, they may do duty as philosophical abstractions, or as a beautiful system of poetical symbolism—for in the mystical correspondence of all these systems of ideas there is such fundamental unity of use.

W.

———

BY BAYARD TAYLOR.

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THE HIGHLAND CHASE.

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BY H. HASTINGS WELD.

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I.—THE SURPRISE.

My charge was in a beautifully romantic and fertile spot, the natural features of which would seem sufficient teachers of the power and the goodness of God, if, indeed, nature were, as some insist, a sufficient teacher without revelation. I soon found myself, upon here taking up my residence, almost the only man who thought it worth his while to study and admire the beauties which nature, with a lavish hand, had scattered over the scene. It was a valley, enclosed on all sides with hills, whose ascents, crowned with verdure, exhibited every variety of tint and shade of green; for the trees of our country display, more than any other, those varying colors and gentle yet distinctly marked contrasts which the painter envies, but strives in vain to transfer to his canvas. There were only two breaks in the surrounding amphitheatre. One was where a mountain stream came tumbling and babbling into the valley; the other where, in a more subdued and quiet current, it found egress. The sinuous path of this little river, or “run,” across the dale, was marked by a growth of beautiful trees, among which the straight-leaved willow, with its silver foliage shivering in the light, was most frequent and conspicuous; other trees which delight in water diversified the long, green defile; and a little boat, which belonged to one of my parishioners, offered me frequent twilight pastime. Some labor, to which, though unused at first, I soon became accustomed, was required to force the boat upstream; but the highest “boatable” point once reached, I had only to turn the shallop’s head and guide it down, letting my little barque slowly float, and conducting it clear of the shallows and obstructions. Delightful were the views which the turns in the stream were continually opening; the overhanging trees, forming a green roof above, were reflected below; and while I seemed thus suspended between answering skies and trees, over my head and beneath my feet, to look in either direction of the stream seemed like peering into a mysterious fairy grot.

One evening as I paused, looking delighted upon the scene of enchantment, a new feature was, as if by magic, added to the picture. A little girl—a child of surpassing loveliness—slipped out from among the bushes, and, skipping from stone to stone, stood on a high rock, near the middle of the current—the beau ideal of such a sprite as one might fancy inhabiting the spot. Her loose tresses floated on the evening breeze, and her scanty drapery—it was mid-summer—as the wind pressed it against her form, exhibited a delicacy and grace of contour which that artist would become immortal who could copy. She did not at first perceive me; and when the flash of my oar startled her, I almost expected she would prove herself a vision, by vanishing into the sky above in a cloud, or dissolving in a foam-wreath in the water which rippled among the rocks behind her.

But youth and innocence are courageous; and she took no other notice of my approach than to seat herself, to await my coming, upon the same stone on which she had been standing. Her artless ease and beauty won my heart—as men’s hearts are often too easily won, through the eyes. Hers was grace unaffected and natural. No drawing-room belle, after years of practice before her mirror, could have vied with this rustic nymph. She possessed what art can with difficulty imitate, and that never entirely—perfect and unconscious self-possession; and she was the more admirable, that in her child-like simplicity she dreamed not of admiration.

I pushed my shallop up beside the rock, and commenced a conversation with her. I was grieved and amazed to find her helplessly ignorant upon the commonest subjects which those who fear God teach their children. She could not even read, she told me. She was born far away, she said—in another land, mother used to say—and did not remember that she ever went to church; but mother had told her that she was carried there once to be baptized, and her name was Bessie.

“Is your mother dead?” I asked.

“No—not dead—I think not; but father—”

A hoarse voice from the shore now shouted her name; and, unalarmed as she had been when I approached, her little frame now shook with terror, and her interesting face was pale and sullen with mingled fear and anger.

“Is that your father?” I said.

She did not stop to answer, but instantly commenced picking her way back to the bank. While she did so, her trepidation several times almost tripped her into the river. I should have watched her every step at any other time, but my attention was irresistibly drawn to the repulsive form which had come, like a dark and unwelcome shadow, over this fair scene. The face was positively one of the most demoniacal in expression I have ever met. Thick, black hair, unkempt, hung over the low forehead, and the shaggy dark eye-brows seemed to glower in habitual gloom over a rough and unshaven face. The expression of the whole was that of a man whose countenance is saddened into surliness, like a clay image of Satan, by habitual strong potations. A slovenly disregard to dress completed the picture of a man who has sold himself to the vilest and most disgusting habits of intoxication.

While I trembled for the fate of such a child, in such hands, she had come within his reach, and, stretching forth his arm, he dragged her to him by the hair, tripping her from her footing into the water, and pulling her to the shore with more inhuman rudeness than I can describe—her dress draggled and muddied, and her limbs bleeding from contact with the sharp stones and pebbles. Blow upon blow the ruffian inflicted upon her, which I could hear as well as see from where I stood. Not a sound, not a cry escaped her; and while I was hesitating whether I ought not to try to reach and rescue her, he ceased beating her, and turned up a path in the bank-side. She silently and doggedly followed him; and I sadly took my way home, lamenting that the beauty and peace of such a place should be so brutally interrupted; and sorrowing more than all, that frequent ill-usage had so deadened the child’s sensibilities as to make her, otherwise so natural and unaffected, thus endure pain with the sullen fortitude of an old offender. I trembled for the life of a child growing up under such influences; for I could see in her future nothing but crime, suffering and degradation.

It was later than my usual time of return when I reached the landing, and there were already lights in the few houses which stood there. I might have mentioned before—but that I hate to acknowledge the fact—that the utilitarian habits of our era had converted my romantic streamlet into a “power” to turn a mill-wheel. It is not a grist-mill, which is a proper appendage to rural scenery, but a woolen manufactory, which, with its unromantic surroundings, caused me many a joke from my friend, the owner of the boat and of the mill. When I excepted to such things as stretching frames, as a blot on the beauty of the landscape, and to the dirty wool and dye-stuff as ruining its romance, he would tell me that if these valleys and rocks had never heard the clatter of his machinery, neither would the “sound of the church-going bell” have disturbed their echoes. There was no answering this, because it was perfectly true, and I could therefore only “humph” and be silent. Though wrong in some points of his course, Mr. Mariot, our “owner,” was a liberal man and well disposed—would there were more such! He built the little church in which I officiated, and he, in effect, supported the rector. If he had not done so, there could have been neither church nor service. And he found his account in the superior order of his establishment; and would have done still more if, beside building the church, he had abated or forbidden a nuisance which sadly impeded my usefulness.

Mr. Mariot stood at the landing, and as I stepped ashore said, “I came down to meet you, Doctor, for Yorkshire Jack is in one of his furious fits, and vows he will beat you—priest or no priest.”

“And who is Yorkshire Jack?” I asked, though a suspicion who he might be instantly shot through my mind. My suspicion was correct—for, upon Mr. Mariot’s explanation, I found that he was the very ruffian whose conduct I have been describing. As we passed the house dignified with the title of the “Mariotdale Hotel,” loud voices came through the open windows. Mr. Mariot would have hurried me past, but I laid my hand upon his arm, and in a low but determined tone said, “Wait, sir!”

Sunday after Sunday I had preached—to little purpose—and here was the reason. Several of my usual congregation, upon whose hearts the word of God fell like seed upon a beaten path-way, sat listening, half laughing, half terrified, at the blasphemy of this fiendish fellow—Yorkshire Jack—and half a score more, who never, by any chance, were seen within the church walls, were applauding him at the top of their voices. O, they will have a fearful reckoning who have supplied fools who deny God with words of blasphemy, and with the scoffings of infidelity, through a prostituted press—who have caught the thoughtless with profane wit, and betrayed the daringly wicked with the hardihood of declared infidelity! The worst words of the worst men were rolled from this wretch’s lips, as if they were his own utterance; the shallowest cant of infidel literature came from his mouth as if his own heart had originated what, indeed, it had only harbored. Out of the borrowed abundance of a vile heart, his lips spake; and the applause of his auditory was scarcely less disgusting than his words were.

Women began to gather round the windows of the house—they dared not enter—and to call in hoarse whispers to their husbands, fathers and sons to come out. Children climbed up and looked in, now gazing, open-mouthed, with terrified interest to the drunken maniac’s fury—now laughing, in thoughtless merriment, as his antics became ridiculous. At length, spent with the vanity of a successful orator to a fit audience, filled with drink, and worn out with rage, Yorkshire John sank on a chair. The efforts of his satellites failed to awaken him to new ravings. The joke was worn out—the women coaxed their husbands away, the children walked off, rehearsing, describing, and laughing over what they had heard. The place was soon hushed and still, the monotonous voice of the water only breaking the silence of the night, and Mariot and I took our way homeward—for I lodged with him.

On our way nothing was said. The family, except Mrs. M., had retired; and Mariot seemed as if he would have made that circumstance a pretext for following them in silence. He put a night lamp in my hand, but I placed it on the table, and, sitting down, took up The Book. He sat also—but it was evidently with unwilling politeness. Conscience was at work—and he was desirous to evade, rather than listen to, her warnings. I opened to the twenty-eighth of Isaiah, and he started as I read, “Wo to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim!”

“Edward Mariot,” I said, “God will hold you accountable for the sin which we have this night witnessed!”

He arose—I thought angrily. He commenced to speak, but a look from his wife dissuaded him. How would he defend himself with such facts so fresh? But I knew that there was a coldness in his manner as he returned my “good night,” with a half nod, such as I never before had witnessed from him. I feared that our friendship, and of course my further residence in Mariotdale, was at an end; but I feared more, that it would be written of my generous but business devoted friend, “Ephraim is joined to his idols—let him alone!”

——

II.—THE PEST HOUSE.

There was an air of uncomfortable constraint over our little family at the breakfast table on the morrow. All thoughts were full of the same thing, but none liked to broach it. Edward Mariot’s manner seemed to say, “I am disposed to forget, if you will be silent.” But I was determined, at any cost to myself, to insist upon Mariot’s doing his duty in relation to the disorderly house upon his premises—or, failing in that, to leave the parish. I felt that my usefulness was at an end if I hesitated to do what Mariot, as well as I, knew was incumbent upon me; for a clergyman who compromises his conscience to keep his parish, is not only an unfaithful servant but an ally to the enemy. Events, however, were so ordered that I retained my friend, and was spared the pain of giving him further reproof. I was informed that Yorkshire John was at the door, and desired to see me.

I rose instantly and went out. Mariot followed, fearing violence—a danger which did not once occur to me; for there are few—very few—so base and cowardly as to make an attack upon a clergyman. The man could not look me in the face. He was abashed and evidently afflicted, and, merely muttering that Bessie was “very bad,” and wanted me, turned and strode hastily away.

Mariot accompanied me down to the little village, and, as we walked, gave me some particulars of the life and character of this singular being, Yorkshire Jack. He had only the one child, and its mother was still living, but had been forced to leave her husband, on account of his cruel treatment. Nobody knew precisely where she lived, or in what manner she supported herself; but she was occasionally seen hovering about the dale, with the intention of seeing or carrying away her daughter. The father detained the child in the hope that the love of a mother would bring her back to him; for, in the years that she had been absent, with a drunkard’s inconsistency, he had earnestly desired her return, and vehemently promised amendment. In these professions, which had reached her through a mutual acquaintance, she put no faith. She had been compelled to fly more than once before; and having, on those occasions returned only to discover the hollowness of his promises, and to receive new abuse, she had resolved to trust him no further. She heard, moreover, through common fame, of all his wild and wicked proceedings; and learning what her child suffered, was the more firmly resolved not only never herself to return, but to take away Bessie if possible. This made John but the more cruel, especially when in drink; and he was at all times mad with suspicion that some one would aid her in the abduction. Hence his rage against his daughter and against me; for as he never conversed even with his own child, he could conceive of no purpose but a sinister one, in my accidental interview with little Bessie. I was tempted to chide Mariot for suffering this state of things without interfering; but judged it discreet to be silent.

John’s house—or rather his room—was the picture of neglect and desolation. He had converted it into a sort of fortification, so that none but a most expert burglar could get in without his permission. Neither could the child get away when once the premises were locked. During the day he had been in the habit, often, of fastening her in, and when she went abroad it was with him. It was shocking to hear that the poor infant had been the forced auditor of her father’s violence on the night before, till, spent with fatigue, she fell on the floor and slept. No wonder, you are ready to exclaim, that she was ill.

But her disease was evidently something more than mere exhaustion. Now feverish and languid, she would anon become chilled. Pains in the head and back, redness of eyes, a husky voice, and sore throat, and a loathing rejection of food, with other symptoms, which I will not expose my medical ignorance by attempting to describe, marked her affection as one of no light character. A hint sent the father for a physician—for remorse often hastens those whom affection cannot influence. Upon his arrival he confirmed my surmises, and pronounced the case one of decided small-pox, and of a very dangerous and malignant type.

The father was frantic, and raved like a madman. He denied stoutly that such could be the case—called us fools and idiots, and ordered all—the physician, Mariot and myself—to leave his house. I looked at my friend, and saw tokens of the indecision and lack of resolution, which was his infirmity. Then turning to the father, I said, “We will not leave this sweet child to perish in your hands; and unless you desist from violence, if Mr. Mariot will not act, I will cause you to be committed as a disturber of the peace!” The man was in a frenzy, and absolutely foamed at the mouth; but the physician and Mariot supported me, and taking advantage of his temporary absence, we turned his own fortifications against him and barred him out, while we should consult what to do in the emergency.

“Mariot,” I said, after he and the physician had proposed and rejected as impracticable several expedients, “there is a pest house ready to your hand. Take that.”

“The tenant will not suffer it,” said he.

“Leave that to us.” And, with the doctor, I went directly to the tavern, and without circumlocution informed the landlord that we were about to bring a small pox patient to his house, and desired a room!

He, too, stormed and threatened, but we insisted. The terror among the residents had now grown intense, for the rumor had spread; and they having collected, with one voice demanded that the house should be taken. It stood apart from the rest, and was in all respects eligible for the purpose.

“If you do bring the child here,” said he, “I will leave.”

“Do so before, if you choose,” I answered, “for in one hour she will be here.” And I further informed him that upon his future quietness and good behavior it would depend whether he should be proceeded against for the sale of spirits to minors and his other misdeeds.

A new cause of alarm was now discovered. The mother of the child lay sick in another house; and investigation into the nature of her illness developed the fact that, in a stolen interview with poor little Bessie, it was she who had communicated to the child the infection. Both mother and daughter were removed to the tavern, a nurse was provided, and all proper steps were taken for their comfort. Yorkshire John, having become subdued by these events, was suffered to be their attendant. The landlord, having received Mariot’s assurance that his reasonable charges should be met, sullenly acquiesced, and did not carry out the threat of removal. The customers, however, fortunately for themselves, avoided the “Pest House,” and his business was reduced completely to that of an infirmary. Thus, what fear of moral contagion could not accomplish, was effected by the dread of physical infection.

——

III.—THE VISION.

Pass over a couple of years, and behold me, the energetic actor—perhaps almost unclerical—in the events of the preceding narrative, now domiciled permanently in the “Mariotdale Hotel.” The old landlord—a good weaver—has resumed his place in the works, and frequently avows his satisfaction at the change which circumstances compelled him to make in his pursuits. Yorkshire John, his very self, is my landlord—and a quieter dwelling there is not in the country. Perhaps much of this is due to the good management of his wife—for she, after all, is the man of the house.

And Bessie?

Poor Bessie! We laid her down to rest in the churchyard two years since, for the illness she had was unto death. It was this shock which recalled the father to his senses; and rest assured I did not spare him. He was not a man who could bear consolation, for it seemed as if he could almost strike the person who offered it. He rebelled against the blow, but found that he was in the hands of a God who will reach those by affliction who refuse to be persuaded by mercy.

Poor Bessie—did I say? Blessed child! If the dead can look on earth, she knows that her father and mother have been reformed and reconciled through her death; that father and mother have learned to believe that the early lost are early saved.

And Mariot, my warmer friend than before, admits that my counsel was sound—that the souls as well as the bodies of his people are in some sense in his charge, and that he who neglects his duty in regard to the first cannot atone for that neglect by care of the last.

I often float in the evening down to Bessie’s rock, and seldom fail to see in the twilight, The Vision. Nor does it now prove to be of the earth, earthly, as once it did—for I know that she is in Heaven.

———

BY ALFRED B. STREET.

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———

BY MRS. E. C. KINNEY.

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A TALE OF INDIAN CIVILIZATION.

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BY HENRY C. MOORHEAD.

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One day, during a ramble in the interior of Pennsylvania with my gun and dog, I found myself on the top of a high mountain, which commanded an extensive view of the surrounding country. The charms of the landscape soon drew off my attention from the pursuit on which I had set out so zealously in the morning; and leaving my dog to chase the game at his pleasure, I indulged myself in pursuing the phantoms of my imagination. In this mood of mind I approached the end of the mountain, whose rugged cliffs overhung the river which washed their base. My dog running to the brink, looked over, but instantly bounded back again, ran to and fro, looking up in my face then crept back cautiously to the spot, and gazed intently at some object below him. Curious to learn what it was that so deeply interested my faithful companion, and anxious to secure it, if worth shooting, I looked to the priming of my gun, and stretching myself on the rock, projected my head over the precipice. A single glance made me follow my dog’s example, and draw back; for, on a kind of shelf, formed by a projecting rock, a few feet below me, sat an old man, his white hairs flowing over his shoulders, calmly surveying the scene around him. From his dress and whole appearance, I judged that he was, like myself, a stranger in that neighbourhood, which made me still more desirous to seek his acquaintance. I soon found a winding path which led to the front of the bluff, and in a few moments brought me to the side of the stranger. To my increased surprise I found that he was sitting at the mouth of a cavern, which had been scooped out of the solid rock by the hand of Nature. Here was as convenient a cell, and as profound a solitude as any hermit could desire. But it was clear that he was no hermit. His was neither the garb, nor the look, nor the address of a man living in seclusion from his fellows. When a sudden turn in the path brought me close to his side, he rose calmly, and saluted me as blandly and as kindly as if we had been old acquaintances. Stammering out a few words of apology for my intrusion, I was about to withdraw, when he interposed with a courteous gesture.

“Would you not like to have a look at my hermitage?” said he; then, perhaps, noticing my look of incredulity, he added, “It is mine now, at least, by the right of possession.”

“Pardon me,” said I, “but I should not take you for an inhabitant of these mountains.”

“And why not, pray?”

“It is not customary, I think, for wild men of the woods and rocks to wear white neckcloths and polished boots,” said I.

The old gentleman laughed at this remark, and then said, “you may call me a temporary hermit, then; for you certainly found me alone, and sitting at the mouth of my cave. Indeed, if I were to assert my claim to it, I doubt whether there is any man living who could show a prior right; for I knew this place when few white men had ever penetrated what was then considered a remote wilderness.”

“The prospect must have changed very much since then,” said I.

“In some respects it certainly has,” he replied; “but the main features of a scene like this continue ever the same. The plough cannot level mountains, nor cultivation change the course of rivers. I have been tracing the windings of this stream with my eye, and find them just as they were; and I recognize every soaring peak, and every projecting rock as an old acquaintance; I saw broken clouds just like these floating above the mountain tops fifty years ago; and I would almost swear that yonder eagle is the same which then sailed so majestically through the air.”

“Those villages and forms, however, must be new to you.”

“Ah, yes!” said he, “there we see the hand of civilization. Where now our eyes take in no less than four neat and thriving villages, there were not then as many clusters of rude wigwams; and these green fields and blooming orchards were an unbroken wilderness.”

“A most happy change,” said I.

“So reason doubtless tells us,” he replied. “Better the peace and industry which now reign here, than the war-whoop, or the listless indolence of savage life. And yet it is melancholy to think how quickly these old lords of the forest have disappeared. Many a league was made in their rude fashion to endure between the parties and their descendants, as long as these mountains should continue to stand, or this river to run. The eternal hills still cast their shadows on the ever-rolling waters; but the powerful tribes who appealed to them as perpetual witnesses of their faith are extinct, or live only in a few wretched stragglers, thousands of miles away in the far west. We have possessed ourselves of their heritage; and to show our gratitude, we abuse them for not having made a better use of their own possessions, and congratulate ourselves on the happy change we have effected.”

“There will never be wanting romantic persons,” I remarked, “to celebrate the glories of savage life, and the felicity of spending a northern winter half naked and half starved, under the precarious shelter of a wigwam.”

“Well,” said he, with enthusiasm, “let them embalm the memory of the Red Man! It will appease the manes of those ambitious warriors to be renowned in song and story. The noblest spirits of the world have gained but a few lines in a Universal History, or a single page in a Biographical Dictionary, and have deemed themselves well paid for a life of toil. Ambition is everywhere the same; and its essence is a desire to be remembered. It may happen that the sad fate of the Indian will perpetuate his memory when the achievements of all his conquerors have been forgotten.”

“I cannot help suspecting,” said I, smiling, “that you have yourself been a warrior, perhaps the adopted son of the chief who presided over these hunting-grounds.”

“No,” said he, “I was not so great a favorite with the chief of these hunting-grounds.”

“Ah, then,” continued I, “your sympathy is that of a generous conqueror for an unfortunate adversary.”

“Not exactly that either,” said he; “I was neither for nor against them. If you are inclined to hear my story, I will relate it here, in sight of every spot to which it refers.”

We then sat down on the rock together, and he proceeded as follows.

I came out as bearer of despatches to what was then the frontier settlement; but an errand of my own induced me to come on here. It was at the time that the Moravians were making zealous and apparently very successful efforts to civilize and Christianize the Indians; and they had a station, under the care of the venerable Luten, which I know must be somewhere in this neighborhood. Although I had known and honored Luten from my boyhood, I should scarcely have ventured on such an expedition for the mere pleasure of seeing him; but he had brought his wife with him, and what is more to our present purpose, his daughter, Mary. Well, it was a rash undertaking to penetrate this wilderness without a guide, just then, for the Indians were in a state of angry hostility toward the whites, in consequence of some real or supposed injuries lately received; but what will not an enterprising young fellow risk in such a cause? Even the bold hunter often carries his life in his hand; and the game I was pursuing was better worth the risk than a wolf or a panther.

Having struck on this chain of mountains, and finding that they commanded a view of the surrounding country, I followed them up until I reached the brow above us, when I caught a glimpse of a figure suddenly gliding down the face of the hill toward where we are now sitting. I cautiously followed, and saw a man whom I knew, from his appearance, to be an Indian conjurer, enter this cave. Without disturbing him, I returned to the hill above, and carefully explored the country round for the station I was in search of. I had given up the search, with the full conviction that there was no settlement in sight, when the light breeze wafted to my ear the sound of human voices. I soon made out that it was a familiar strain of sacred music, and sweeping over the valley again with my telescope, discovered an encampment just where yonder creek empties into the river. It was the hour of evening worship; and the savages were tuning their voices to the unwonted notes of a Christian hymn. Of the venerable missionary, it might emphatically be said, that he pointed to heaven, and led the way. He had left country, home, and friends; the habits of a lifetime, and the tastes of a highly cultivated mind, for the sake of the poor Indian; and it mattered little to him whether his head reposed in a palace or a wigwam, or whether his bones were laid in the Fatherland or in some wild glen of the New World, so that his Master’s work was sped. If such thoughts passed through my mind whilst my eye rested for a moment on him, they were instantly put to flight when I saw another figure in the group. But he would have forgiven my irreverence, if he had known of it, for the love he also bore his gentle Mary.

I quickly descended the mountain, and reached the encampment just as the sun was setting. Luten received me as a son; Mary as a brother, except that the blush which suffused her face and the agitation of her nerves were something more than fraternal—so, at least, I flattered myself. When I inquired for the missionary’s wife a tear started into the eye of both father and daughter. I understood it all—she had found a grave in the wilderness.

I had many questions to ask as well as to answer, and much news to tell, and the evening wore away before curiosity had been satisfied on either side. But I felt anxious to know their plans and prospects for the future; I therefore inquired of Luten how he was succeeding with the Indians.

“Far beyond my most sanguine expectations,” he replied.

“You really think, then, that it is possible to change their savage natures,” said I.

“Why should it be thought doubtful?” said he. “Are we not all descended from the same parents—all partakers of the same fallen nature—all hastening to the same bourne? But you would scarcely recognize the gnarled and stunted oak, springing from the scanty earth afforded by a crevice in the rock, as belonging to the same species with the monarch of the forest, striking his roots deep in a generous soil, and spreading his branches proudly toward heaven. Pour into the minds of these poor heathen savages the light of civilization and Christianity, and in a few generations they will have become the noblest race of men in the world.”

“It is a very common belief, however,” said I, “that they are incapable of civilization; and does not experience seem to justify this opinion?”

“My experience proves the contrary,” said he, with emphasis. “The people now in this encampment were lately fierce and blood-thirsty warriors; I wish the docility and meekness they now exhibit were more common among white men.”

“But has there been time,” I asked, “to warrant the conclusion that the change will be permanent?”

“I have no fear as to that,” he said; “the change is radical—the savage nature is extinct in them; and, like children, their plastic minds can now be moulded into any form by education.”

“I hope it will prove so,” said I; “but do their chiefs go with them?”

“Their favorite young chief, Tamaque, now leads them as zealously in the path of peace, as he formerly did in the war-path,” he replied. “A noble young fellow he is, too.”

“Indeed he is,” said Mary, who had hitherto been listening to our conversation in silence; “he is always so kind and gentle. I love him as my own brother.”

The very bluntness of her words might have satisfied me that she meant only what she said; but somehow or other I did not like her form of expression, and I began to feel anything but partial toward the person they referred to. “Pray what does he look like?” I inquired.

“Oh, he is very handsome,” said she, with the same provoking simplicity.

“And no doubt very accomplished,” said I, drily.

“Why, yes,” she replied, “he is by no means wanting in accomplishments. He was educated at one of our own schools, and, it is said, proved a very apt scholar. Indeed, his civilized accomplishments are very respectable; and as to his savage ones,” she added, laughing, “he is foremost in all the exercises of his tribe.”

I joined in the laugh, rather faintly, and then added, maliciously:

“No doubt even his copper color is unusually bright.”

“By no means,” she replied; “his color is that of a white man a little tanned by exposure to the sun.”

“The truth is,” said Luten, “he is only half Indian, and he seems to be endowed with most of the virtues of both the white and red man, without the vices of either.”

The affair had now become serious, and I could no longer help regarding this accomplished half-breed chief as a formidable rival.

“On him, more than any man,” continued Luten, “rest my hopes for the regeneration of his race. I imagine to myself that I see in him the future founder of Indian civilization. Yes, my young friend, ere you have attained the age which now bears me to the ground, you will see these savage tribes every where pursuing the arts of peace; you will see them kneeling at the altar of the living God, and putting to shame the boasted civilization of the white man. My old body will be dust long before that; but this hope, and belief, have sustained me amidst all the toils and privations of a life in the wilderness.”

I looked anxiously in the speaker’s face; for the thought struck me that his mind had become unsettled. But his placid countenance and clear, steady eye, at once convinced me that what I had deemed madness, was nothing more than the enthusiasm of a bold and sanguine reformer. I could not find it in my heart to disturb the vision which afforded him so much delight by any expression of my doubts, and still less did I feel inclined to enter upon any further discussion of the merits of Tamaque. I had heard too much about them already for my repose that night; and every remark I had made on the subject had only served to call forth a fresh eulogy. I therefore gladly accepted Luten’s invitation to retire to my bear-skin couch. Many were the visions that chased each other through my brain during my broken slumbers, and Tamaque was connected with them all. Sometimes I saw him the king of a mighty people, with Mary at his side, crowned as a queen. Again I found myself engaged in deadly conflict with him, and waked just in time to escape receiving the death-blow at his hands. At another time I seemed to have got the better of him, and was about to plunge my sword into his bosom with fierce exultation, when my hand was arrested by a reproachful look from her, and started up and thanked heaven that it was only a dream. At length, however, I fell into a sound and tranquil sleep. But I was not permitted long to enjoy it; for, just at the dawn of day, a strange Indian rushed into the camp, yelling the war-whoop until the mountains echoed it back again. The whole camp was instantly in motion; in a few minutes the council-fire was blazing, and the Indians had ranged themselves around it.

The messenger soon told his story. A number of fanatic white men had banded together and sworn eternal hostility to the Indians. They professed to consider them as standing in the same relation to themselves as the Canaanites of old did to the children of Israel; and, therefore, in the name of God, they waged an exterminating war against them. They had just fallen upon an Indian village of Tamaque’s tribe, and slaughtered the inhabitants, without regard to age or sex. This messenger had alone escaped to tell the dreadful tidings. His words produced a deep sensation on these fierce warriors, just emerging into civilization. The old instincts of their natures were evidently reawakened; and it seemed as if a signal only were wanting to make them rush forth, as in former days, with tomahawk and scalping-knife.

Luten hastened to check the torrent of passion which threatened, in one moment, to sweep away the fruits of all his labors. Standing, like a venerable patriarch, among his rebellious household, he endeavored, by a skillful blending of persuasion with parental authority, to restore them to a sense of duty. Reminding them of their solemn vows, he conjured them by that regard for plighted faith which is the red man’s boast, not to forget or break them in this moment of passion. He pointed out the high destiny they had to accomplish, in spreading light and knowledge all through the wilderness, and leading the way to a great reformation of the Indian race. Then, in a more solemn tone, he spoke of the world to come; painting the happiness in store for those who persevere to the end, and the uncontrollable miseries reserved for the unfaithful. His earnest eloquence was perfectly adapted to their simple apprehensions, yet eminently calculated to strike their imaginations by the wild imagery with which he embellished it. Their stern natures relented as he spoke, and he seemed to be on the point of regaining all his influence over them, when another messenger arrived, and signified that he had important news to communicate.

He told of new outrages, more cruel, if possible, than the first; and whilst every heart beat high with rage and horror, turned to Tamaque and addressed him thus:

“These griefs are common to us all; but the words I am now to speak will fall more dismally on Tamaque’s soul than the howling of a famished wolf. Yesterday you had a father and a sister. I saw that father’s gray hairs red with blood; I saw that sister, when flying from the blazing wigwam, driven back by the white men’s spears—and she returned no more. Then I came, swift as a hunted deer, to sound the war-whoop in the ears of Tamaque and his warriors.”

Throughout the whole scene Tamaque had been sitting as impassive as a statue. It was impossible to gather from his looks any hint of what was passing in his mind; and when, at length, he rose, the fire that beamed from his eye alone enabled me to anticipate his purpose.

“Warriors!” he said, “we must listen to the song of peace no longer. The white man’s words are love, but his embrace is death. Let us return, without delay, to the customs of our fathers. Even now I hear their voices, from the land of spirits, calling us to war and vengeance.” Then turning toward me, he continued: “The stranger has come just in time—seize him and drag him to the torture.”

With savage yells some gathered round me, whilst others hastened to prepare the stake, and others to collect the implements of torture. I had seen the operation once in my life, and remembered it well. In that case, the victim was stripped naked and tied with a grape vine to the top of a pole, having a free range on the ground of ten or fifteen feet. At the foot of the pole was a flaming fire of pitch-pine, and each Indian held in his hand a small bundle of blazing reeds. The death-signal being given he was attacked on all sides, and driven to the pole for shelter; but, unable to endure the flames that scorched him there, he again rushed forth and was again driven back by his tormentors. When he became exhausted water was poured on him and a brief respite given, that he might recover strength for new endurements. The same scene was acted over again and again, until they had extracted the last thrill of anguish from his scorched and lacerated body.

Similar preparations were now making for me, and I watched them with shuddering interest as the fire was kindled and the faggots distributed. Just as they were about to drag me to the stake, however, Luten interposed. But all his appeals and entreaties were unheeded; and when at last he begged them, if they must have a victim, to take him and spare his young friend, Tamaque rudely repulsed him, and ordered him to be carried away to his tent. My last hope of escape was now extinguished, when lo! a figure glided suddenly into the arena, arresting the attention of all, as if she had been a messenger from Heaven. Can the daughter control these wild spirits who have rebelled against the authority of the father? She binds her white handkerchief round my arm, and then whispers in the ear of Tamaque. The words, whatever they are, act like a charm on him. His stern countenance relaxes almost into a smile, and he stands for some moments absorbed in meditation. Again she whispers a few earnest words; upon which he comes forward, takes me by the arm, and leads me, in silence, to the outskirts of the encampment.

“Now go!” he cried, pointing toward the east; “you are indebted for your freedom to one I love better than you. See that you make a good use of it; for, if you should be retaken, and brought here again, not even her entreaties shall save you from the torture. Away! and here,” he continued, handing me a red belt, “bear to the false-hearted cowards you came from this token of the hatred and defiance of Tamaque and his warriors.” He waved his hand to prevent my replying, and stalked away.

I was now free, but by no means satisfied with the manner in which my liberty had been procured. What meant this mysterious influence of a fair young Christian girl over a haughty savage chieftain? What were those whispered words which had wrought the sudden charm? Had she yielded to some request, or given some pledge in order to make her prayer effectual? My mind was racked with torments scarce less poignant than those which just before had threatened to assail my body. I resolved at all hazards to see the end of it; and, therefore, in defiance of fire and faggot, concealed myself at a point close by, which commanded a full view of the neighborhood.

I had not been long in my hiding place when I saw a procession, with Tamaque at its head, move from the camp in the direction of this mountain. I conjectured at once that they were coming here to consult the conjurer, and resolved to follow them. When they had descended the face of the precipice to the spot where we are now sitting, I crept cautiously forward on the rock above, and found myself in full hearing of their consultation.

“How often have I warned you,” said the conjurer, “against the teachings of the white men. I told you they only wished to rob you of your courage that they might destroy you the more easily; but you refused to listen to me.”

“Well, well,” said Tamaque, “that is past; there is no help for it now. Let us talk of the future.”

“Last year,” continued the conjurer, “when no game was to be found, and when the corn all withered away, I told you the Great Spirit was angry because you were forsaking the customs of your fathers; but you turned a deaf ear to my words.”

“I remember it all,” said Tamaque, “but go on, and tell us of the future.”

“They promised you,” persisted the conjurer, “that if you would worship their God you should go to their heaven when you died. I told you that your spirits and theirs could never live in peace in the same spirit-land; but you would not believe me.”

“Come, come, I am tired of this,” said Tamaque.

“No forests, no rivers, no deer, no hunting and no war,” continued the conjurer, “what would the Indian warrior do in the white man’s heaven?”

“Cease your babbling!” cried Tamaque, in a tone no longer to be disregarded. “If you can foretell our fortunes in this war speak; if not, out on your boasted wisdom!”

The conjurer seemed to feel that it was necessary to come to the point. After a long pause, he asked:

“What have you done with the white stranger that came to your camp last evening?”

The old impostor had no doubt seen me at the same time I had seen him as I crossed the mountain, but he was determined to make a mystery of it. Tamaque seemed puzzled.

“How did you know of his coming?” he inquired.

“Tamaque doubts the conjurer’s wisdom,” he replied.

“No!” said Tamaque, “you would not tell me what I come to hear. Go on, now, and I’ll believe you.”

“Has the stranger been put to death?”

“He is gone,” said Tamaque.

“It was wrong,” said the conjurer; “he should have died at the stake. The Great Spirit calls for a sacrifice. The missionary and his daughter must die.”

“No!” said Tamaque, “it is impossible.”

“It must be so,” replied the conjurer; “they must die before sunset.”

“It cannot be,” said Tamaque firmly; “command me to do any thing but that.”

“I command you to do that,” replied the conjurer, “or I will call down confusion on your war-party.”

“I tell you,” said Tamaque fiercely, “they shall not die. Say no more about it.”

“Obstinate man!” said the conjurer, “you dare not disobey me. They shall die, and you shall kindle the fire beneath them.”

Tamaque now sprang forward and seized the conjurer by the throat. “Villain!” he exclaimed, “I warned you to speak of that no more. Name it again, and I will toss you headlong down the mountain.”

Finding that Tamaque could not be overawed, the wily conjurer now changed his tactics.

“You might safely spare them,” he said, “on one condition; but I dare not name it.”

“Go on,” said Tamaque, “you have nothing to fear, if you do not speak of their death.”

“The anger of Tamaque is dangerous,” continued the conjurer; “and who can tell what words will rouse it?”

“No, no!” said Tamaque mildly, “I will hear you patiently; and if you require me even to leap down this dizzy precipice, I’ll obey you.”

“Listen, then,” said the conjurer; “and if my words sound harsh in your ears,” said the old hypocrite, “let not your anger be kindled. They shall live if you choose, but then the white maiden must become Tamaque’s wife.”

I was looking over, at the moment, from the rock above, full at Tamaque. He started convulsively; his whole frame shook with emotion; whilst a gleam of joy absolutely lighted up his dark features. My own sensations were not less violent, perhaps, though somewhat different in their character.

After a pause Tamaque asked, in a tone of affected indifference:

“If I consent to this, do you promise success to our expedition?”

“Yes,” said the conjurer, “you will conquer all your foes, and reestablish the power and glory of the red man. Behold! a vision of the future rises up before me. I see Tamaque great and powerful, the ruler over many nations; and far off, for many generations, I see his children’s children walking in his footsteps.”

“Your words are good,” said Tamaque.

“So will be your deeds,” said the conjurer. “Strike boldly, and fear nothing.”

“Tamaque knows no fear,” replied the haughty chief. “To-morrow he will go forth with his warriors, and thus will he rush upon the foe.” As he spoke he heaved from its resting place a huge fragment of rock, which bounded down the mountain roaring and smoking, and crushing all before it, until, with a loud plunge, it disappeared beneath the bubbling waters.

I had now heard and seen enough; and there was no time to be lost if I wished to save her from—from what? Confusion on the thought! My head reeled, and I came near falling down amongst them. But I soon rallied, and made all possible haste to reach the camp before Tamaque.

Suddenly, as I emerged from a clump of trees yonder on the bank of the creek, I saw her whom I sought close before me, kneeling on a mound of earth,—doubtless her mother’s grave. I stood entranced, and listened, in spite of myself, to the broken sentences which she uttered aloud.

“And save, oh, merciful Father,” she murmured, “save his white hairs from the dangers which surround us.” Her filial words here became inaudible. The next sentence that reached my ears related to a different person. “May thy powerful arm protect us from the cruel rage, and the still more cruel love of that dreadful man!” My jealous ears drank in these words with ecstasy. They were a balm to my wounded spirit; a compensation for all my sufferings. Again she spoke aloud: “And him, the stranger, who wanders, unprotected, through the wilderness; oh! guard his steps from harm, and grant, in thine own good time, that—” her voice now died away into a gentle whisper. When it rose again she was saying, “And for me, in mercy, give thy unhappy child, here, in this hallowed spot, a peaceful grave.” I began to feel that my listening, however inadvertent, was little less than sacrilege; and, therefore, quietly stole away out of hearing.

As soon as I discovered that she had risen to her feet, I again drew near. Great was her surprise and consternation at seeing me.

“Oh! why do you linger here,” she cried. “You should, ere this, be far on your way toward home. Fly instantly, and look not behind you; for, if you should be taken by these cruel savages no human power can save you from a dreadful doom.”

“I know that well,” I replied; “but can you think me so careful of my own life as to run away and leave you to their tender mercies?”

“Fear nothing for me,” she said; “they do not rank me among their enemies, and will not harm me.”

“But although you may be safe from their hatred, have you nothing to fear from their friendship?” said I.

The tide of confusion mounted to her brow at these words, and she trembled in every limb. But, quickly recovering herself, she said: “Come what may, I share the fate of my father.”

“But go,” said I, “bring your father quickly, and we will all escape together.”

“No,” said she, sadly, “he is old and feeble; his absence would soon be noticed; they would certainly pursue us, and easily overtake us.”

I could make no reply to this, for I knew that we could not take her father with us, and I felt sure that she would not go without him. With the dogged resolution of despair, therefore, I said:

“Your own fidelity teaches me my duty. I shall remain in these woods to watch over your safety. Seek not to change my purpose. Better endure all the torments these fiends can inflict than the shame and remorse I should suffer if I left you.”

I spoke in a tone that could leave no doubt of my sincerity or firmness. She evidently felt it so, and stood for some minutes with her eyes fixed on the ground in silent meditation. Then, at length, raising her head, she abruptly asked:

“Can you paddle a canoe?”

I replied that I could with considerable skill.

“Then go down immediately to the mouth of the creek,” she continued; “I will bring my father there, and it is possible that we may yet escape across the river. It is worth the trial, at least, and is our only hope.”

I hastened to the place designated, where I found two canoes moored to the shore. In a few minutes Mary appeared, almost dragging her father along. When the old man understood our purpose he refused to get into the boat.

“No,” said he, “I cannot leave these poor children, whom I have so long taught and prayed for. Deserted by their pastor, they would soon return to their old habits, and the labor of long years would lose all its fruits.”

“But, sir,” I replied, “they have already withdrawn themselves from your authority. You cannot safely remain amongst them, for they now regard all white men as their enemies.”

“I will stay,” he answered, “and bring them back to the fold from which they are wandering, or else lay down my life among them.”

“But your daughter,” I continued; “surely this is now no place for her. Come! let us place her in safety, and then, if you choose, you can return.” I saw that he hesitated; and so, taking him by the arm, I led him, with gentle violence, into the canoe.

“Are these the only canoes at the station?” I asked.

Being answered in the affirmative, I directed Luten to hold fast to the empty one, and then pushed off from the shore. My intention was to cut off pursuit by carrying the empty canoe some distance into the stream and then setting her adrift. The river was then about at its present height, and dashed over these rapids with the same violence as now. It was certain that no boat could drift through them without being swamped or broken to pieces.

Accordingly, when we had attained what I thought a sufficient distance from the shore, I directed Luten to let go his hold. Scarcely had he done so when a shriek from Mary, whose face was turned toward the shore, was immediately followed by a plunge, and then another, into the water.

“It is Tamaque and another Indian,” she exclaimed, “and they are swimming for the empty canoe.” I cast a hasty glance behind me, and saw all the peril of our position; but I had no time for making observations. My business was to ply the paddle.

“Now,” continued Mary, “they have almost reached it; and now they have caught—but see! they have upset it in trying to climb in. No! it has come right again; and now Tamaque has got in safely, and is dragging his companion after him. But it is too late; they are almost at the falls, and they cannot stem the current. Look! Merciful Heaven, they will go over, and be drowned!”

Obeying the gentler impulses of her nature, she thought only of their danger, forgetting that that was our only chance of escape.

“Oh! how they do struggle for their lives,” she continued; “and now they are standing still—no, they are moving—they are coming—faster and faster—they are coming toward us!”

I again looked back for a moment, and, truly, they were coming, and evidently gaining on us. Luten meanwhile sat in the bottom of the canoe in a fit of total abstraction.

“I will not leave them, nor return from following after them,” he muttered; “they have gone astray, but I will bring them back, and they shall yet be the instruments, under God, of regenerating the whole Indian race.”

But the state of things was now becoming critical, and Mary cried out in terror:

“Oh, father, help!—take that other paddle and help, or we are lost.”

The old man roused himself up, took the paddle, and went to work in the bow of the canoe. But he was unskilled in the business, and did more harm than good. I begged him to desist, but he only replied by increasing his well meant exertions. At length, however, he rocked the boat, and threw her out of her course so badly, that I was obliged to command him, peremptorily, to sit down; and he was soon again lost in meditation.

Meanwhile our pursuers were rapidly gaining on us. Under the guidance of her two powerful and well-trained workmen, their canoe bounded forward at every sweep of the paddles like a race-horse. I now saw that it was all over with us. We were still a long way from shore, and they were almost upon us. Nor could it avail us any thing even if we should succeed in landing first. They would capture us on the land if they did not on the water. My heart sickened at the thought. To me captivity would bring unutterable torments; and to my innocent and lovely companion a fate still more deplorable. Was there any alternative? I looked the whole subject steadily in the face for one minute, and then my resolution was taken. With a single dexterous sweep of the paddle I brought the head of the canoe directly down stream, and then urged her forward toward the roaring cataract. Tamaque uttered a loud yell of rage and disappointment; and, the same moment, his tomahawk whizzed by within an inch of my head. But the current now drew us on with fearful rapidity. Mary sat pale and silent, gazing anxiously in my face; whilst her father continued unconscious of all that was passing. Now and then I could hear his voice amid the tumult of the dashing breakers mournfully bewailing the apostacy of his neophytes.

We had now reached the very brink of the foaming precipice, when my eye caught a narrow streak of blue water, which evidently descended in a gradual slope. I directed the canoe toward it, and she went down, plunging, I thought, entirely under; but she rose again filled with water, but still afloat. I threw my hat to Mary; and, whilst I kept the canoe steady in her course with one hand, I seized my hat in the other and commenced bailing. In a few minutes all danger of sinking was removed. We had now a free course before us, and an impassible barrier (so it was deemed) between us and our pursuers. We felt that we were safe;—all but Luten; to whom our danger and our safety seemed equally indifferent. His thoughts were far away in the land of dreams, where he had so long dwelt, and from which he would not yet depart. We spoke to him, but he made no answer. At length his head began to sink slowly down, and Mary hastened to support it. An ashy paleness now came over his features; his breathing grew short and difficult, and his mutterings became inaudible; except once, when the name of Tamaque trembled on his lips. Then his eyes became fixed; his lips ceased to move; his hand dropped heavily down at his side; and now,—the hot tears that rain from the eyes of his dutiful child fall on the brow of death.

It was now near sundown; and when we reached the nearest white settlement it was near morning. There we buried Luten; and his daughter being now an orphan, and without a protector in the world, why, of course,—but I need not relate what followed. Suffice it to say that I was no longer jealous of Tamaque, but even felt a pang of regret when I heard, soon after, that he had fallen in battle.

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BY MISS L. VIRGINIA SMITH.

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BY GEO. D. PRENTICE.

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A TRUE TALE OF THE NORTH-WEST.

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BY MAJOR RICHARDSON.

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Of all the tribes of Indians with whom it has been our lot to mix, and these have not been a few, we know of none who can surpass in the native dignity and nobleness of manhood the Saukie tribe. We, however, speak not of them as they exist at the present day. Many years have elapsed since fighting against Hull, Winchester, and Harrison, we numbered, as co-operating with the division of the army to which we were attached, three thousand fighting men of the élite of the warriors of the principal tribes, headed by the indomitable and ever lamented Tecumseh, whom, as a boy, then first attempting his coup d’essai at arms, we ever loved and revered, and with whom half an hour before his fall, we shook the hand of cordiality, and separation—forever. We repeat, at that period there were, varying slightly in number at intervals, not less than three thousand with the eighth division of the British army—and these were the choice warriors of the following tribes: Shawanees, Delawares, Munsees, Hurons, Wyandots, Miamis, Chippewas, Ottowas, Kickapoos, Foxes, Minouminies, Pottowattamies, Winnebagoes, Loups, Sioux, and lastly, for we cannot recollect some two or three others—the Saukies. Each tribe had its peculiar and distinctive characteristics—but no one so markedly so as the last named people, and next to them the Winnebagoes. We have remarked that we do not know what the Indian tribes, even in their original hunting grounds have become since so long abstinence from the pursuits of war and adventure, but then, the Saukies were the noblest looking men of all we have ever since beheld in any quarter of the globe we have visited. They were a collective impersonation of the dignity of man, as sent first upon earth by the will of God; nor were these characteristics of manly beauty peculiar only to a few, but general to all. A Saukie warrior, arrived at the full stage of manhood, was tall—generally from five feet eleven to six feet in height, and of proportionate symmetry of person. Their carriage was erect, dignified, graceful. Their look serene, imposing without sternness. Their features bore the Roman impress, and seldom did we look upon a Saukie, arrived at mature age, without the memory adverting at once to the dignified senators of the forum of which we had so recently been reading. There was a nobleness—a consciousness—a native dignity about these people that always inspired us with a certain degree of awe and respect; and so deeply was this sentiment implanted in us at that very early period of a somewhat adventurous life, that our beau ideal of manly beauty has ever since continued to be a Saukie warrior of the commencement of the present century.

The period of occurrence of the incidents of our little tale was some four or five years prior to the American declaration of war against Great Britain, and when the North West Company of Canada, whose wealth, acquired in the pursuit of that trade, was at one time great, held various stockade forts in the heart of the Indian country. The ambulating village of the Saukies was then situated on a branch of one of those small streams on which the forts were usually built, and at a distance of about forty miles from that which will come more immediately under our notice.

White Bear was one of the most honored of the Saukie chiefs, and even among men whom we have just described as so eminently prepossessing, he was remarkable. He was forty years of age, and possessed a majesty of mien and carriage that won to him the respect of his tribe not more than did his wisdom in the council, and his daring in war. He had but one wife, and she was much younger than himself, but years had so little to do with the estimate in which he was generally held by the squaws of his tribe, and particularly by his wife, whose passion for him was ardent as his own for her, that this disparity had never even been noticed. Indeed, their friendship for each other was the remark of the whole tribe. For an Indian, he took great pride in her beauty, and spent with her many hours that ought to have been devoted to the chase. War for some years past there had been none.

Sunflower was tall and graceful. She had very black, soft, languishing eyes—marked, yet delicate eyebrows. Her nose, like that of her tribe, was Roman, but more delicately marked than that of the men, her teeth were white and even, her mouth small, and her hair glossy as the raven’s wing, and darker than the squirrel’s fur. The full and massive club into which it was tastefully rolled and placed behind the back of her neck, proved its fullness and redundance. She was elegantly formed. She had never been a mother, and her nut-brown bosom had all the roundness of contour of a Venus, and the smoothness of the Parian marble. Her hands and feet, like those of all her race, were small, and yet there was a development of her whole person that set all art to improve it at defiance. Late at night she always bathed in the sweet waters of the stream, and on its low banks combed the long and luxuriant hair that overshadowed her person, and with the chewed root of the grape-vine, added fragrance to her breath, even while she increased the dazzling whiteness of the teeth she rubbed with it. To crown all the fascinations of this Indian wife—this favored daughter of a race in which the interesting and the beautiful are so rarely found, she had a voice whose every note was laughing music.

There was one in that camp, and of that tribe, who saw the happiness of White Bear, not with envy, for his nature was too generous for so low a passion, but with regret that destiny had not given to him the beautiful, the enchanting Sunflower. He was consumed with the most ardent love. He lived only in and for her—hung upon her look, fed upon her glance, and yet he had never spoken to her. His soul melted away with love for her. To look at her alone was enjoyment the greatest he could taste. The chase was deserted, his very flute, in which he excelled, and on which he often played to the great delight of the admiring Indian girls, was neglected. Not so his dress. No young Saukie bestowed more pains in decorating his person than did the tall and gracefully formed Wawandah, and this not from any foolish love of display, as because he wished to appear favorably in her eyes, should she ever be induced to regard him. The savage equally with the civilized, tries to win a woman as much by dress as by address. But in vain Wawandah courted his toilet. The vermilion was applied to his cheek and lips without the desired result—the Sunflower never once caught his eye, or if she did, she was too much engaged in thinking of the White Bear, to be conscious that any other of her tribe sought to win her attention.

Days, weeks passed on, with the same unvarying result. Wawandah was sorely grieved at heart. He began to pine away. His soft and melancholy eye became dull. He had no pleasure in the chase which took him far from the encampment. Every step that he trod in pursuit led him farther from the spot trodden by her, the very soles of whose feet he worshiped, and he could not continue. Thus, when a stray buffalo would cross him, easy to be killed, and offering himself as an unerring mark to his rifle, his passion would so trouble his mind as to unnerve his arm. Then the ball would pass unwounding by, and the half sneers of his companions arise and bring the blush to his cheek; as they bade him tauntingly leave the rifle to be handled by men, and go and amuse himself with the women. In like manner he sought to avoid the war-dance, and the ball playing, and the foot-race, for his mind was too painfully interested to engage unrestrainedly in these amusements, and unless excellence was to be obtained in whatever he undertook, Wawandah cared not to be a competitor. Wawandah was beginning to lose caste not only with the elders of the tribe but with the young men who were jealous of his superiority, and so much was he talked of that the very women knew all that was said by the warriors, and the Sunflower like the rest. It was the first time Wawandah had ever come under the notice of her he so fondly loved, and as he knew the cause, he secretly blessed the fate which had, even under circumstances so humiliating to the pride of a warrior, been the cause of her bestowing even the slightest attention upon him.

The White Bear had been the friend of the father of Wawandah, who for ten long years, according to Indian computation, had slumbered in his grave with the red stained pole at its head. Since he had taken the Sunflower to his bosom, he had neglected the boy, for his own breast was full of the natural selfishness of love, and he had not found time to regard him as he would have done had he been free from the influence that now exclusively governed him in all things. But when the Sunflower told him that there was a youth in the village who, oppressed by some secret care, had so degenerated in the tastes and pursuits of the young warriors, as absolutely to have incurred their scorn, her husband recollected the name, and determined as far as he could to comfort him, and to restore to him the respect of his tribe; and straightway he sent a young boy to the wigwam of Wawandah, who was then lying on the skin of a grizzly bear, which he had killed before the spirit of guilty love had entered into his heart, and the recollection of his skill and prowess in obtaining which was the only circumstance that still preserved to him a certain consideration among the elders of the tribe. Astonished, almost dismayed at the message, Wawandah rose from his couch, and disguising his feelings, said to the young messenger, “That it was good. He would go to White Bear’s wigwam presently.” The boy departed, and Wawandah was torn with emotion. What was the meaning of this message? Since the death of his father, the Black Vulture, the White Bear had taken no other notice of him than he had of the young warriors generally; then how was it that he sent for him now, when almost shunned by the young men of his tribe; he bowed submissively and uncomplainingly to the effects of the passion that was preying upon his heart, rendering him regardless of all things else. Why, he again asked himself, was this? Or had the White Bear discovered his secret in the only way in which it could have transpired—through his eyes—and sent for him to reprove and to threaten. Still he was glad that he was sent for, no matter for what reason, for there was a faint hope at his heart that the Sunflower might be present at the interview in the wigwam, and he felt that it would be pleasant to be condemned in her hearing for that which she alone had, however innocently, occasioned.

Still, with slow, and timid, and undecided step, he approached the tent of the great chief. The latter motioned him to be seated. Wawandah, who, on entering, had seen in a corner of the tent a muffled figure, which his beating heart told him was the wife of the White Bear, silently obeyed, and waited until the chief had finished his pipe. Wawandah now and then turned his eyes furtively in the direction of the squaw who was embroidering moccasins with the dyed quills of the porcupine, and could perceive that she, too, occasionally glanced at him in the same furtive manner. The heart of Wawandah was troubled yet full of gladness. To be looked at with interest by the Sunflower had been the summit of his highest ambition.

“Wawandah,” said the White Bear, who had finished his pipe, and was now emptying the bowl of its ashes, “the chief, your father, was a great warrior in the tribe; and when, a year after his death, you slew the white bear that was about to kill a young girl, all the tribe thought that you too would become a great warrior. What says my son—why is this?”

“Ugh!” was the sole and assentient reply of the youth.

“The braves say you cannot shoot, and that your arm is wide as that of a squaw from the buffalo or the deer—that every papoose can beat you in the race—that you cannot wrestle, and that the ball never rebounds from your foot. Is this true? Are you no longer a warrior? Why is this, my son?”

Wawandah was silent for a moment, and then placing his palm over his heart, he said in so mournful a tone, that the Sunflower suddenly started and looked up. “Very sick here. Wawandah wishes only to encounter another bear. The victory would not be the same.”

As he uttered these words, his eyes beaming with melancholy tenderness were turned upon the wife of the White Bear. It was just at that moment she looked up. Their glances met. His dark and handsome features became flushed with crimson, as he traced in hers he thought, pity, sorrow, and a full understanding of his position. A thousand delicious thoughts possessed his being. That look of commiseration had repaid him for every insult he had endured. To be rewarded by another, he would have subjected himself to the same a thousand fold. As for the Sunflower, she could not tell wherefore, but it seemed to her as if a new light had dawned upon her being.

“My son,” said the chief, presenting his hand, “I pity you, for I see it all. You love a squaw, who does not love you—and that I know is enough to turn the rifle aside, and check the speed of the race. When the heart is sick the body is sick also. I am old, Wawandah, but I know it—

“See!” he continued, after a short pause, “there is one who ought to be your sister. The White Bear owes her life to you. Without your arm his wigwam would be as a desert. Taken from the fangs of one white bear, you have preserved her for the arms of another.”

The Sunflower and Wawandah looked this time fully, tenderly into each other’s eyes—a new affinity had been created—a new tie mutually acknowledged. It was the first time they had been made aware that she was the young girl thus saved. They both colored deeply, and with a consciousness that that information was fraught with good or evil, for the future, to themselves. Both awaited with interest and impatience what was to follow.

“Wawandah,” pursued the chief, “I feel that I have wronged you by neglect. But I will make amends for it. Once more you shall be a man—a hunter—a warrior. You shall abandon your tent and live in mine. It is large enough for us all. The Sunflower will be glad to receive him who saved her life in the most daring manner. Her smiles will make you forget your hopeless love, and when her hands have prepared the morning meal, we shall go forth to the chase, for I, too, feel that my pretty Sunflower too often dazzles my path with its brightness, and keeps me from the tracks of the deer and buffalo.”

“Oh, the friend of my father is too good,” replied Wawandah, with a manner changed, from despair to life and hope, which, although unheeded by the husband, was not lost upon his beautiful wife. “Wawandah is thankful. He will sleep in the wigwam of the White Bear, and gain from his goodness new courage to his heart, and strength to his arm, and skill to his eye. He will go forth to the chase as before. He will forget the love of the woman he cannot have, in the friendship of his sister—in the child the Good Spirit allowed him to save for the friend of his father. Wawandah will be happy, and the White Bear will make him so.”

The Sunflower rose from the spot where she was seated at her work, and moving in all her gracefulness and dignity of carriage to her husband’s side, leaned over him, and thanked him for his goodness in permitting her to aid in soothing him to whom she owed her life and happiness with him.

“Wawandah,” said the husband of the Sunflower, “you may go; I wished to give ease to your heart—not to pine away like a love-sick woman. You live here. I am not quite old enough to be your father, for five-and-twenty years have passed over your head, but I shall be every thing else to you; nor is Sunflower old enough to be your mother, but she shall be your sister, and her laughing eye shall make you glad. Go, then, part with your wigwam, and let it be known throughout the tribe the White Bear adopts you as his son.”

From that hour Wawandah became a changed man. He lived in the wigwam of the White Bear. The beautiful Sunflower was ever before his eyes. Her presence inspired, her soft eye turned in gratitude upon him who had preserved her life, infused animation, if not hope, into his being. He had no other thought, no other desire than to be loved by the Sunflower as by a sister, to be near her, to listen to her sweet voice, to mark the expression of her beautiful eyes, to follow the graceful movements of her tall form—all this he enjoyed, and he was happy. Sustained by her approval, once more the buffalo and the elk fell beneath his unerring rifle, and his honors graced the interior of the tent which the Sunflower decorated with her own hands. Again he was foremost in the race, and left his competitors behind when darting into the swollen stream they buffeted against the strong current that essayed to check their upward progress. In the wrestling-ring no one could equal his dexterity and strength; and where once his foot touched the ball, no opponent could bear from him his prize until it had reached the desired goal. The women were often spectators of these sports, and approved the manliness and activity of the handsome and modest-looking Wawandah, but none more than his newly found sister, the peerless Sunflower of the White Bear.

“Strange!” she would muse to herself, as she saw him amidst the loud plaudits of the aged and the young of the warriors, of the matron and of the maid bear off every prize for which he contended—“strange, that before he came to dwell within our wigwam, he was as a child, and even now is a strong man, proud in his own power. It was disappointed love made him weak and uncertain of aim in the chase, he said to the White Bear. What, then, has made him strong, for no love warms him yet but the love of his sister.” The Sunflower sighed; she thought of the eloquent looks he had often cast upon herself, and she endeavored to give a new direction to her thoughts.

Often would the White Bear and Wawandah set out on a hunting excursion of a couple of days, and return so laden with the meat of the buffalo and the deer, that the horses they took with them for the purpose, could with difficulty walk under the heavy burdens. Then would the children, seeing them coming from a distance, clap their hands, and utter shouts of rejoicing, until the whole encampment attracted by their cries, would turn out and gathered together in small groups, await the arrival of the hunters, to whom the word and hand of greeting were cordially given. The Sunflower would watch all this from a distance, and in silence; and her heart would become glad, for well she knew where the choicest of the game killed by Wawandah’s hand would be laid—at his sister’s feet with a look of such touching eloquence of prayer for its acceptance that the very anticipation took from her loneliness in absence; and she was always right, for never on one occasion did Wawandah fail, and when he had given of the best to the wife of the White Bear, his soft and beautiful eyes rendered more lustrous by the deep hectic overspreading his brown cheek, would thank him with such expression of silent eloquence, that her own heart would invariably flutter, and her own cheek flush with as deep a crimson. And then, happy and contented and rewarded for all his toil, Wawandah would bear the remainder of his game to the tents of the chiefs, and distribute among the grateful wives of these the remainder of the proceeds of his unequalled skill. No one was now a greater favorite throughout the Saukie camp than the late despised Wawandah, the son of the Black Vulture.

Once in the middle of August the White Bear and Wawandah set out with two others on an excursion, which was to last five days. Time had so accustomed the Sunflower to the presence of her brother, and his absence on similar occasions had so seldom exceeded a couple of days, that when the fifth had arrived she was uneasy and unhappy; and her longing for Wawandah’s return became such that she now, for the first time, became aware of the full extent of her own feelings for him. She trembled to admit the truth to herself, but it was in vain to conceal it. Guilt was in her soul. She loved Wawandah. True, but she was resolved that while she sought not to change the character of their existing relations, she would allow them to go no further.

It has already been shown that the Sunflower was in the habit of bathing in the stream on which the encampment of the Saukies had been pitched. This was about a mile up, and in a secluded nook or narrow bay, the overhanging banks of which, closely studded with trees, formed a complete shelter from the observation of the passing stranger. The evening of the day previous to that on which the hunters were expected back was exceedingly sultry, and the Sunflower had gone with another Saukie—a daughter of one of the chiefs—to indulge in her favorite and refreshing bath. After disporting themselves for some time in the running and refreshing stream, they were preparing to resume their dress, when both were startled by a low and sudden growl from the top of the bank immediately above them. The Saukie maiden looked for a moment, and then trembling in every limb, and yet without daring to utter a word, pointed out to the Sunflower, on whose shoulder she leaned, two glaring eyes which, without seeing more of the animal, they at once felt to be those of a panther evidently fixed on themselves. The animal gave another low growl, and by the crashing of the underwood amid which it lay, they knew it was about to give its final spring. Filled with terror the Sunflower uttered a loud scream and even as the animal sprang downward from his lair the report of a rifle resounded, and the whizzing ball was distinctly heard as it passed their ears. The water around the gurgling spot where the panther leaped into the stream, was deeply tinged with his blood. He had been wounded, but not so severely as to prevent him from being an object of unabated terror. Not five seconds, however, had elapsed, before another form came from the very spot whence the panther had sprung. The beast, infuriated by its wound, was running or rather bounding rapidly toward the Sunflower, who, paralyzed at the danger, stood incapable of motion, and standing immersed up to her waist in the stream, and with her long dark hair floating over its surface. With a wild and savage cry, meant to divert his attention to himself, Wawandah, for it was he, pursued the animal as rapidly as he could through the interposing water. Startled by his unexpected appearance, the Sunflower became, for the first time, conscious of her position, when turning, she fled as fast as she could with a view to gain the beach and turn the ascent to the hill. This act saved her from severe laceration, if not death, for it afforded time for Wawandah to overtake the monster. Seeing itself closely pursued, the latter turned to defend itself, and before Wawandah could seize it by the back of the neck, with a force against which it vainly struggled, it had severely wounded him in the left shoulder. Infuriated with pain, and still more so at what he knew to be the exposed position of the Sunflower, the latter, even while the teeth of the panther were fastened in his shoulder, drew from his side his deadly knife, and burying it to the handle in its heart, while he worked furiously to enlarge the wound, at length contrived to leave it lifeless floating on the surface of the stream. This done, his first care was the safety of the Sunflower. He knew that while he continued there she would not return for her clothes, which were lying on the beach immediately under the point from which he had, on hearing the scream, leaped into the river, and therefore he had no alternative than to call out in clear and distinct tones that she might return without fear, as the panther was dead and he himself about to ascend the bank on the opposite side, to secure his rifle and await her coming, as, after the danger she had so barely escaped, he was determined not to allow her to be exposed, unprotected, to another.

That evening it was made known in every part of the Saukie encampment by the daughter of the chief, that but for the sudden appearance and prompt action of the brave Wawandah, both herself and the Sunflower would have been torn to pieces by an enormous and savage panther, whose eyes were balls of fire, and whose teeth were like the wild boar’s tusk. Again were the plaudits of the camp bestowed upon him, and the head chief ordered a war dance to be performed in honor of the exploit.

The dance was continued until late at night, but Wawandah did not mix in it. Thoughts were passing in his mind that little disposed him to join in festivities given in honor of himself. For the first time, that day he had seen enough of the symmetry of form of the Sunflower to know that she could no longer be as a mere sister to him. He felt that she must be to him as a wife or he must die. Giving as a reason, and it was a true one, that his arm pained him very much, he retired to his bear-skin couch long before the war dance had terminated.

The Sunflower sat at his side, and with a decoction of herbs which she had boiled down to a thick gelatinous matter, ever and anon bathed the wound, and with a look so eloquent with thankfulness for this second serious service which he had rendered her, that Wawandah felt an irrepressible fire kindling in his veins, while his eyes were absolutely riveted on her own.

“How came my brother so near me and so far away from the camp,” she asked, desirous of turning his thoughts from an admiration that pained, yet not displeased her, “and where has he left the White Bear and his companions. Was it well to come back without them?” she concluded, half reproachfully, for she began to feel the danger of her position.

“It was well that Wawandah came,” he said, with more animation than he had hitherto evinced. “But listen, my sister. An elk, with horns like the branches of a great tree, had fallen beneath my rifle, when suddenly a panther sprang from its lair. Determined to lay its skin at your feet, I followed it. The chase was long; it lasted from daybreak to the setting sun. I knew not where I was, or in what direction I was going. Suddenly the panther crouched in a small thicket. I heard a cry. Oh, who could mistake the birdlike voice of my sweet sister. The hair on the crown of my head seemed to move. I felt my cheek white as that of a pale face—my heart was sick. As the panther took his spring I fired. Oh, had I been myself, I should have killed him dead, but fear took away my skill and I was a woman, even as I had been for many moons before, until the sister that I loved without hope brought comfort to my soul by smiling upon me under the roof of her own wigwam.”

The eyes of the Sunflower bent beneath the ardor of his gaze,—her heaving bosom marked her emotion, and her hands dropped mechanically at her side. Now, for the first time, she knew that it was through his silent love for her that the generous and noble-hearted Wawandah had incurred the odium of his tribe.

“Yes,” pursued the youth, “now that the panther is dead, and the Sunflower is safe, Wawandah is glad of the wound received in saving her. His step had never dared to move toward the spot where she bathed, but the Good Spirit led him, even in the guise of a panther, to behold that which he had never seen but in his dreams.”

He paused; leaning on his elbow, he had taken the small hand of the Sunflower. He felt it tremble beneath the slight pressure of his. Then he continued:—

“The love that filled my heart like the devouring fire of the prairie, before the good White Bear adopted me as his son, was nothing to what it is now. The Sunflower must be Wawandah’s wife or she must see him die. He will not live without her.”

Never had the warrior awakened such interest in the bosom of the wife of the White Bear. His beautiful eyes spoke a language she could not resist. The deepening crimson of her cheek, the languor of her eye, and the heaving of her bosom, were her only answer.

“Then the Sunflower is Wawandah’s forever,” he exclaimed, as he caught and pressed her to his heart, and imprinted the first kiss of love upon her brow.

Still she replied not. She felt as if an inevitable fate was impelling both to their destruction; but there was sweetness in the thought. The enormity of the ingratitude to the White Bear did not at first occur to her.

“We must fly,” she at length murmured. “The Sunflower is now the wife of Wawandah, and she must seek another home. The White Bear will be here to-morrow, and never can the guilty one he loves bear to look upon his generous face again.”

“The Sunflower shall look upon him no more—no more dazzle the White Bear with the glare of her beauty,” answered the youth. “Far from this Wawandah shall erect his tent, and alone. No one but his wife shall know where he dwells, or share his solitude. He has no thought but of her. While she gladdens his sight with her presence, he will ask no more of the Spirit of Good. The camp is scarcely yet at rest. An hour before the dawn we will depart; and when the sun rises its fairest flower will have traveled far from the tent of the White Bear forever.”

“The heart of the Sunflower is full of gladness,” said the latter. “Never does she wish to behold the face of another warrior but Wawandah. She loves him because he has so long loved herself. Ah, how much must she love him, when she leaves the tent of the White Bear forever to fly with him. It is very wicked this. The Good Spirit will punish her, but her love for Wawandah is too great. She has not power over herself. She would not stay if she could. And now it is too late.”

At an hour before dawn Wawandah went stealthily forth. All was stillness in the camp, and only here and there was to be seen the flickering of some expiring fire, while the low growl of the dog, too vigilant to be quite silent, and yet too lazy to bark outright, greeted him as he passed outside the skirt of his encampment. Presently he arrived at an open space or sort of oasis in the forest, where were tethered many horses with great blocks of wood fastened to one of the fore fetlocks. Selecting two of the best looking and best conditioned of these, he put bridles upon them, and removing the unwieldy clogs, led them back to the door of the wigwam of the White Bear. This time the dogs did not suffer themselves to be disturbed. They seemed to recognize the horses, and to know that he who led them was of the tribe to the masters of which they belonged, and that the doubt they had in the first instance entertained no longer had existence. Leaving the horses standing quietly at the entrance, Wawandah went in. The Sunflower had put together every thing that could be conveniently placed in two bundles, and then, having thrown the rude saddles on the horses, Wawandah now fastened one to each crupper. The Sunflower was dressed in leggings of blue and the moccasins she was making when first Wawandah entered the tent. A man’s black hat, with a white plume thrust through the band, was upon her head, and a mantle of blue cloth, fastened by a large silver brooch, upon her shoulders. Her linen was white as the snow, and altogether her great beauty was adorned with the richest articles of her limited wardrobe, and in a manner befitting the occasion. While Wawandah, too, decked himself in his best and secured his faithful weapons and companions of the chase, she cut from the long hair she loosened for the purpose, a large tress, which she tied near the root with a blue ribbon, and fastened it to a nail within the wigwam door. This was a token to the White Bear that she still regarded even while she had deserted him for ever.

Wawandah pressed her again fondly to his heart. He was not jealous, but glad that the heart of the Sunflower bled for what she knew the White Bear would suffer at her loss. He raised her in his arms to the saddle she had been accustomed to use. Then carefully closing the door, and putting a stick over the wooden latch to secure it, he vaulted into the other. He then turned his horse, followed by the Sunflower, in the direction of the bathing ground, beyond which the course he intended to take lay, and as they passed, a beam from the moon which had then risen, glanced upon the form of the dead panther floating nearly on the spot where he had killed it.

The Sunflower gazed upon it with deep interest, for she felt that to that hideous beast was to be ascribed the eventful step which she had taken, and which was to decide the future misery or happiness of her life. Presently the encircling arm of Wawandah, who had reined in her horse, influenced by a nearly similar feeling, clasping her to his heart, seemed to admonish her of the intensity of joy he, too, had derived from the same cause.

That embrace refreshed and invigorated them. Once more, at the gentle bidding of Wawandah, the Sunflower put her horse into a gallop, and ere the dawn of day the camp of the Saukies had been left far behind.

——

PART SECOND.

At the distance of fifteen miles from the encampment of the Saukies, and on the same stream, was a small post, belonging to the Canadian North-West Company of that day. As was usual in that region, it was surrounded with a stockade, as a protection against any sudden attack of the Indians. The force within consisted principally of voyageurs, trappers, hunters, and, in fine, of men of such avocations as were connected with the fur trade, then in its highest stage of prosperity. The gentleman in charge was a Mr. Hughes, for many years subsequently, and even at this day, one of the British superintendents of Indian affairs. Besides the buildings which composed the post, there was a good deal of spare ground, which had been alloted for the security of horses and cattle, embraced within the picketings. Around this place the ground was denuded of trees, and nothing but a mass of shapeless stumps was to be seen extending for nearly half a mile in every way, except toward the front, which was bounded by the stream which divides it from the woods on the opposite bank.

One evening, late at night, an Indian was seen approaching and driving before him a number of horses, tied by strings of bark, and so disposed as to keep up the order of what is called the Indian file. Three stout Canadians were sitting on a sort of elevated platform, which served as a look-out over the stockade, one cutting with a great clasp knife a piece of fat pork upon his bread, that served him as a substitute for a plate; a second puffing a cloud of smoke from a long handled black stone pipe; and the third lying on his back with his knees drawn up, and singing one of those plaintive boat songs which were peculiar to the Canadian voyageur of the commencement of the present century.

“I say, Baptiste, cease that refrain of yours and listen,” said the man who was eating his supper of pork, and who evidently was at that moment on duty as look-out. “I am sure I hear the tramp of horses—and sure enough it is them. See how they come, in file, like a string of dried peaches. I’ll bet the best beaver I shoot or trap to-morrow, that scoundrel Filou, the Chippewa, has been at his old work again and stolen a lot.”

Baptiste finished his singing, as directed, jumped to his feet, and looked in the direction in which his companions had turned their gaze. There was a mass of something moving, but whether men or horses the night was too dark to enable him to distinguish with accuracy.

“Parbleu!” said the man who was smoking, “we had better tell the master. The Saukies are not over friendly to us, and it may be a party of them stealing upon us, in the hope of catching us napping.”

“Bah! Latour,” returned the man of the watch, “the Saukies don’t make so much noise when they move. It’s horses’ hoofs we hear, and not the feet of men. A bottle of whisky to a blanket it’s Filou with a fresh prize.”

“The odds are certainly long you give,” said Le Marie, after he had delivered himself of a prolonged puff; “but, sure enough, it is a gang of horses, and that’s devilish like the Chippewa, who rides the first and leads the remainder.”

All doubt was soon at rest, by the well-known voice of the Chippewa asking for admission for himself and horses into the stockade.

“Comment!” said Le Marie, “do you take me for a blancbec, to suppose I shall do any thing of the sort? You have stolen those horses, Filou, and no good will ever come to us if we let them in here.”

“Ask captin,” said the Chippewa, in a tone that denoted he expected his application to be made known to that responsible officer.

The moment was a critical one. The Saukie Indians, as has been before stated, had manifested a hostile feeling toward the inmates of the post, and the avoidance of offense had been strictly enjoined, as a matter of policy, upon the people of the establishment. Filou, more than all the others, knew of the position and means of defense of the stockade, and therefore it became particularly a matter of precaution not to offend him.

“Take the rascal’s message to the chief, Baptiste, and know if he is to be admitted or not.”

In a few minutes Captain Hughes, in no very good humor, made his appearance at the look-out, and seeing the large train of horses which the rascal had stolen, told him, decidedly, that he himself might come into the fort if he chose to leave his plunder behind him; but that the latter must remain without.

The Chippewa grumbled a good deal at this decision, told him that he had lost a good horse, and finally decided on remaining without himself and keeping watch over the animals.

The night passed away, and it was about an hour before dawn when the report of a rifle was heard, and soon afterward a second, from a greater distance. Aroused from their slumbers, Captain Hughes and his people instantly rose and repaired to the look-out, where the drowsy sentinel was just awakening from his sleep, and were accosted from without by the Chippewa, who told them, with an alarmed air, that the enemy were stealing upon them, and earnestly craved admittance for himself and horses. This request, after some little hesitation on the part of Captain Hughes, was granted. His people were kept on the alert during the remainder of the night, but nothing was to be seen that could justify an alarm. Toward morning, however, Captain Hughes resolved to go forth with a party and reconnoitre. He insisted that the Chippewa, who was extremely unwilling to move, should accompany them, and point out the direction whence the firing proceeded. In vain he pleaded that he was tired and wanted rest. They compelled him to lead the way.

Until the day began to dawn, every thing was dark in the extreme—so much so, indeed, that the undenuded stumps which, scorched and blackened by fire, had been left to complete their natural decay, were scarcely visible; but as the mists of night cleared away, the opening of the forest, about a mile distant from the stockade, was distinctly seen, and all eyes were turned toward it, as though to a place of danger.

“Hush!” said Le Marie, who the next after the Chippewa headed the party, making a sign for them at the time to stop. “There is no enemy there,” he said, “but one, and him I should very much like to put a bullet into. Look! don’t you see that white bear?”

The whole party looked attentively, and distinctly saw the skin of a white bear, but its actions were so erratic that none could account for the singular attitudes into which it appeared to throw itself.

“I’ll soon stop his dancing,” said Le Marie, as he raised his ride, “and if I don’t finish him, Baptiste, you can follow my shot on the instant.”

“Stop!” said Captain Hughes, striking down the leveled rifle; “pretty eyes for voyageurs and hunters, you have. Don’t you see that it is only the loose skin of a white bear, and that there is some one waving it toward us as a signal?”

“Parbleu, so it is!” said Le Marie, doggedly, for he was annoyed, priding himself, as he did, on his keenness of sight as a hunter, that the captain should have noticed his mistake.

As they drew nearer, they could make out, just within the skirt of the wood, an Indian, reclining against a tree, and waving toward them, as a signal, the skin of a grizzly bear. Close at his side, and leaning her head upon her hands, was a woman.

The party approached, still headed by the Chippewa. When they had arrived within a few yards, the stranger Indian drew up his body, seated as he was, to his full height, and looking indignantly at the Chippewa, said:

“That is the man who shot me. The eye of Wawandah is good, and he can tell his enemy even in the dark.”

“How is this?” asked Captain Hughes, turning to the horse stealer. “You, then, fired the shot which you pretended to me was that of an enemy approaching the fort.”

The Chippewa for a moment was confused, but soon he replied, sullenly:

“He came to steal my horses; he had taken two of them, and was going off when I fired. He fired again, but his ball went into a stump at my side. Was I right?”

“Never come near the fort again,” said Captain Hughes, angrily, for he was interested in the condition of the noble featured youth. “You are a black-hearted villain. You steal horses in droves; and because another deprives you of one or two, you take his life.”

The eye of Wawandah brightened as he listened to the words of Captain Hughes, which were, of course, spoken in Indian. “Wah!” he exclaimed, “I did not steal—I only exchanged horses. Those I left were better than those I was going to take. They were fresher than my own—I wanted them. But,” he added, fiercely, “I am not going to die by his hand—he shall not dance over my scalp. Sunflower,” he asked, after a moment’s pause, “do you love me still, now that I am going to die and leave you without a home?”

Deep sobs came from the bosom of the unhappy and guilty woman. She bent her head over him, and said, gently:

“Oh, should I be here did I not love you, Wawandah?”

“Good!” he answered, pressing her vehemently to his heart. “It is sweet to me to hear the Sunflower say that she loves the dying Wawandah. The white chief will take care of you when I am dead.”

“If Wawandah dies, the Sunflower will die too. She cannot live without him. Her heart is too full to live alone.”

“No, no!” he replied. “The white chief will go with you to the White Bear. He will say that I am very sorry for the wrong I have done him, and that the last prayer of Wawandah, who has been so ungrateful to him, is, that he will take back his wife—the sweetest flower of the Saukie tribe.”

The Sunflower raised her drooping head, and looked Wawandah steadily in the face for some moments. She made no remark, but resumed the same desponding attitude.

Summoning all his remaining strength—for life was fast ebbing away—the Indian now stretched himself to the utmost tension of his body, and, shouting out the war-cry of his tribe, drew his knife and plunged it into his heart—then fell back and expired.

For some moments the Sunflower lay as one unconscious on the bleeding body of the ill fated Wawandah; then raising herself up, she revealed her face, the extreme paleness of which was visible even beneath the dark hue of her skin. She asked the Chippewa to come near her, that she might communicate to him a message for the White Bear, offering her silver arm bands as the price of his service.

The cupidity of the Chippewa, more than any remorse he felt, or desire to assist the Sunflower, induced him to approach and receive the trinkets and the message; but while he was busily engaged in securing that which was on her left arm, the Sunflower suddenly drew the knife from the body of her husband and plunged it into the heart of the Chippewa, to whom she owed all the bitterness of her fate. He fell dead at the feet of Wawandah, and before Captain Hughes, or any of his party, had time to prevent her, or even to understand her intention, she raised herself to her feet with the reeking knife in her hand, and killed herself with a single and unfaltering blow.

Deeply shocked and pained by this lamentable catastrophe, Captain Hughes caused his men to cut litters with their axes and carry the bodies to the fort. No one felt regret for the just punishment of the Chippewa; but the fate of the unhappy lovers created a deep sympathy in the hearts of all—the more so from the surpassing personal beauty of both. Two graves were dug—one inside and the other on the outside of the stockade. In the first was placed a rude coffin, lined with a buffalo skin, which Captain Hughes had substituted for that of the grizzly bear, were placed the bodies of Wawandah and the Sunflower. A sort of mound was then raised over it, and at the head was stuck a short pole, the top of which, for about twelve inches, was painted red. The Chippewa was thrown unceremoniously, and without coffin, into the grave that had been dug for him outside.

Some time afterward Captain Hughes, having occasion to visit the encampment of the Shawnees, on a subject connected with the differences then existing between them and the North-West Company, took the opportunity of communicating to the White Bear all that he knew relating to the flight and death of the unfortunate Sunflower and Wawandah; adding to the detail the account of the sepulchral rites he had caused to be accorded to them.

The chief, a good deal emaciated and of much sterner look than when last introduced to the reader, at first heard him with grave and imperturbable silence. But when he came to that part of his narrative which described the remorse of Wawandah for the injury he had done him, a tear, vainly sought to be hidden by a sudden motion of the head, stole down his cheek.

“Will my brother smoke?” he said abruptly, handing him his pipe, while he, with the disengaged hand, pressed that of Captain Hughes with the utmost cordiality.

“Listen, my brother,” he said, after a pause. “You have done well to the White Bear. His wigwam is empty without the Sunflower, who used to shed light upon his hearth. Joy no more can enter it. The White Bear is alone among the rest of his tribe, like a blasted pine in the midst of a green forest; but it does good to his heart to hear the son of his friend—the broken-hearted one that he took into his lodge to soothe and to heal—was sorry that he stole the flower of his heart, and left but a thorn in its place. The White Bear is sorry for them both; but they were young and foolish, and dearly have they been punished. I forgive them, brother,” again extending his hand, “and I love the white chief, who did not leave their bodies to be devoured by the wolves, but buried them as the White Bear would have them buried. I am glad too that you treated the Chippewa as a dog, without any sign to mark where he lays. I feel that many moons will not pass over me; but while they do, I will live less unhappy at my loss, and ever love the white chief.”

Thus terminated their interview; and Captain Hughes heard, not one month later, of the death of the White Bear.

———

BY MRS. JULIA C. R. DORR.

———

———

BY WM. M. BRIGGS.

———

OR THE CROWN OF JEWELS.

———

BY ANGELE DE V. HULL.

———

In a large, old-fashioned house, at the pleasant country place of ——, dwelt a happy and united family, consisting of a father and five daughters. Through the wide, long hall merry voices were ever heard, and round and round twinkling feet went dancing on the pleasant gallery that ran on all sides, that there might be nothing to stop these light-hearted creatures in their course. Each had her neat, sweet-looking chamber, wherein, at times, she might retire to while away leisure hours with some cherished book, or with rapid pen convey to paper her pure and fresh thoughts—thoughts that were too sacred to be spoken—that wove themselves into dreams of delight, that were never, never to be realized. Happy, happy days! when they could weave these bright fancies, and dared to turn away from reality. The past had but its pleasures—the present its more rational yet constant enjoyment, and the future was hid by the rose-colored cloud that floated over its blessed anticipations.

Mr. de la Croix looked upon his daughters as his crown of jewels, and the homestead as the humble and unworthy casket that contained it. They were a host within themselves to drive away dull care, and left him by the most exemplary of wives to perpetuate her fondly cherished memory. Dearly loved they to dwell upon her virtues, her unfailing benevolence, her undying love for them all, and that holy piety that burned like a precious light throughout her life. Sacred to them were the paths her footsteps trod, the flowers she loved, and the trees her hand had planted; and they strove with all their might of youth and inexperience to supply her place to the husband she had loved and taught them to love.

“Where are you all—Blanche, Lisa, Kate, Rose and Minnie,” cried Mr. de la Croix, one morning, coming out of his room. “Who is ready to sew on a button for me?”

“I, papa,” “and I,” answered the five, hurrying on their dressing-gowns and opening their doors.

“I am first,” said Rose, coming forward with her thimble and needle. “Go back, every one of you!” and she pushed them playfully away.

“And what a shame that papa has to call us up for such a thing. Minnie, this is your week—naughty girl! and you must be scolded for negligence,” said Lisa, shaking her dignified head at the culprit.

Minnie ran behind her father, peeped into his face as she poked hers under his arm, and raised her saucy eyes to his. She was the youngest, and consequently a privileged imp, depending upon every one else to mend and darn when her turn came.

“Go away, you wild girl,” said her father, smiling. “Rose is the most industrious of you all, for she is dressed before any of you.”

“Rose is housekeeper, and had to be up, papa; don’t inflate her with praise she does not deserve. I have been up an hour.”

“An hour! and what were you doing, Miss?”

“Je flanais—there’s French for you, in good earnest; and I heard the first bird that sang this morning,” answered Minnie, with a gay laugh. “I was making reflections of the most profound nature when you disturbed me—and thus the world has lost a lesson.”

“And I have been reading La Bruyère before my dressing glass,” said Blanche, complacently, as soon as the mirth that followed Minnie’s speech had subsided.

“Well, I have been at work already,” added Lisa, as she drew herself up. Lisa was the tall one, and had the air of a princess.

“Oh, Lisa! you remind one of the old lady who sat in her rocking chair and did nothing,

and Kate’s merry black eyes danced about from one to the other. “Now, I have been writing verses.”

“Yes, be an authoress—scribbler, and have a mania for dirt, disorder and ink-stands. Pshaw! look at your fingers,” said Lisa, pointing to them.

“I’ll wash them—I’ll wash them!” cried Kate, “without mumbling over ugly spots, like Lady Macbeth. My little nail brush will do more than all her perfumes.”

And running to her room she went to work to verify her word.

Soon they all met at breakfast, and Lisa presided at the cheerful board, like the mother bird, while the rest chatted around her. She was not the eldest but the most thoughtful, and to her all came for assistance and advice. Her long fingers could fashion dresses, collars, ruffs, bonnets, if necessary, and her ingenuity trampled upon impossibilities with every new pattern that appeared. So, while Blanche busied her fine head with metaphysics, piano, harp and guitar, the three others learned from both to be agreeable and useful members of society.

Society they cared little for. Blanche had been a belle par excellence until she became tired and disgusted with admiration and lovers, whose name was legion. Lisa never liked one or the other. She contemplated balls and beaux at a distance, and called them absurdities, though nothing pleased her like dressing her sister, and seeing her courted and flattered, night after night and day after day.

As for Kate, she had a touch of the romantic; she liked to sing and dance at home, loved to laugh and be merry with those of her own age, but thought that home the fairest and best place in the world. So, after a winter of dissipation, she foreswore the beaumonde, and vowed its votaries a heartless set.

Rose’s large, soft, dark eyes never wandered farther than the fences that bounded her father’s enclosures. With something of eccentricity she loved to steal off and enjoy a lonely hour at the close of each day, and her piety became a proverb. Nothing could move her out of the reach of the household gods, and at eighteen she was a child at heart and in manner.

Minnie was the imp! Minnie loved the world, and longed for a debut, as the minor “pants for twenty-one.” For her all hands must work—for her all hands must stop; and thus they were all at home, a bird’s nest of different nestlings, ready to take wing and fly when the parent bird has ceased to control their movements.

“Come, daughters, sing and play,” said Mr. de la Croix, as he sat in his arm chair, at the wide hall door. “What are you all about, eternally sewing and reading? Give the old house some life, will you?”

Blanche rose and seated herself at the piano, running her little white hands skillfully over the keys. Kate pulled the harp out of the corner, and soon a loud, clear voice swelled melodiously through the air. Then came a chorus of fresh young notes, and the soft strains of the piano, with the harp’s wild, sweeping music, mingled together, while the father sat listening to his crown of jewels, full of rapture and pride.

“Give us that trio in Guillaume Tell, sister,” said Rose, when they had finished, and little Minnie glided into Blanche’s seat, while the three grouped around her to comply. Then the chairs were drawn together, and the five tongues rattled like magpies to the half bewildered Mr. de la Croix, until he called for his candle and went to his apartment, followed by Kate, singing,

“Minnie!” said Lisa, holding up a dress with a wide rent in it, “is it ‘the weakness of my eyes that shapes this monstrous apparition,’ or is it a reality?”

“There, now!” cried the girl, snatching the dress from her, “you are on one of your poking expeditions. I didn’t intend you should see this, sister Lisa, for Rose promised to mend it for me.”

“And has Rose nothing to do for herself, that she is to waste time on your carelessness?” returned Lisa, gravely. “It is not two weeks since we made this for you, and now it is ruined.”

“Give it to me,” said Rose, quietly; “I did promise to mend it, and would have done so before, but had the house to attend to; and the keeping it and providing for it is any thing but a sinecure. Get me a piece out of the scrap basket, Minnie.”

“That is the way you all combine to spoil Minnie,” said Blanche, raising her head from her book. “She will never be fit for any thing.”

“Ay!” said the other, with an arch look and pointing to the volume, now closed, “and who makes pretty things for Miss Blanche, while she sits in her room poring over dull maxims and writing them off?”

“And how am I to teach you if I do not learn something myself?” asked Blanche, with a serious expression on her fair souvenir-like face.

“Don’t teach me any of your old cynic Rochefoucauld’s scandal. I hate him, for he never says a good thing of the human heart, and places my own motives so often before my eyes that I take him for a reflector of my inward-self, and blush.” And Minnie covered her face in mock confusion.

“So much the better, then,” said Rose; “for St. Paul tells us to know ourselves, and I vote that we treat you to a double dose of ‘les maximes’ every day.”

“Is Daniel come?” said Minnie, bending low and performing a salaam before her sister, who was seized with a fit of laughter that prevented her replying.

“I hope that you will keep your absurd ideas to yourself, Minnie,” observed Lisa, who now began to rip away at the torn skirt. “You are talking treason when you begin to abuse La Rochefoucauld.”

“Treason or no treason, then,” cried she springing out of her seat, “the whole world may come and listen to me, if my head were the penalty. So, I am off to the library. No, I wont go there, either, lest the old gentleman’s ghost jump at me; but I’ll go and practice the ‘Bamboula,’ and sister Blanche may dance a Congo polka to it.”

“Sister Blanche leaves polkas to giddy girls, but is, nevertheless, delighted to hear them speak of practicing. You were as lazy as a sloth over that ‘Sueia’ of Strakosch’s, and do not know it yet.”

“Pshaw! ça viendra, as papa says when you all talk gravely over Rose and me. I am a perfect pattern of industry with regard to my music, am I not, Lisa?”

“You certainly do pummel away unmercifully at the poor piano,” said Lisa; “but half the practicing consists of imitations of Mrs. this, or Miss that, in style, position or banging.”

“And don’t people go about and give imitations of different lions? I’m sure I only endeavor to carve out a distinguished name for myself.”

“Did this in Cæsar seem ambitious?” quoted Lisa, turning with a smile from the willful thing that would never hear reason.

“Pray, what fame is to arise from your imitation of Mr. Gamut’s elbows? Or from Lucy Grey’s symphonies?” asked Kate.

“Kate! Kate! did you not laugh yesterday when I played for you until the tears rolled down your face? And didn’t you vow that Mr. Gamut himself sat at the piano?” said Minnie.

“Indeed I did. More shame for me!” exclaimed Kate, laughing anew. “But your imitations, as you call them, are more than human risibilities could resist. I call Rose to witness in this case!”

“Don’t call me to witness any more of Minnie’s pranks,” said Rose. “I cannot encourage them.”

“I’ll force you, then,” cried Minnie, seizing Kate around the waist. “Now look at Mr. and Mrs. Dobbs waltz together.” And round she spun, pulling Kate after her, until Lisa and Blanche were adding their peals of laughter to Rose’s hearty amusement. Away they went until Minnie whirled her sister out of the room, and soon after sat down to the Bamboula in sober earnest.

Thus ended all attempts at controlling Minnie, and her task seemed that of creating merriment wherever she went and turning all reproof into a mockery. Indeed, she laughed too constantly, and there were times when Lisa shook her head gravely at this perpetual merriment. A woman’s duties begin so sternly and so positively from the hour she marries—the bridal wreath so quickly withers into one of cares and fears, that the sight of a creature like Minnie, full of thoughtlessness and glee, saddened the heart that knew something of them all; and poor Lisa, with her responsibilities, vainly warned her young sister to laugh less and reflect more.

“I wish that you were married, Blanche,” said she one day, as they sat together. “We see so few strangers at home, and seem so much like equals, that Minnie will fly into the face of every thing and every body without ever being curbed into tranquillity.”

“And what good would my marrying do, in the name of wonder?” said Blanche with a stare.

“A vast deal, particularly if you were to bestow yourself upon a man like Mr. Stuart, for instance.”

Lisa went on with her work, and the deep blush that suffused her sister’s fair face was unperceived.

“Lisa!” said Blanche, after a pause, and her voice faltered; “Lisa! would you wish me marry?”

“Not unless you are confident of being happy, dear Blanche,” was her reply, and she looked up.

Once more the bright color mounted over the cheeks of her companion, and the tears stood in her eyes. She held out her hand, and Lisa pressed it affectionately as she remarked her unusual emotion.

“My dear sister! what is it that affects you thus?”

“Because, Lisa—I have had thoughts of marrying, not for Minnie’s sake—but—for my own.” She covered her face and burst into tears. Lisa rose and clasped her in her arms, soothing her with pet names and kind words.

“Dear Blanche—sweet dove! tell me all about it? Is it really so? and have you promised—”

“I have promised nothing, Lisa,” replied Blanche, raising her head and leading her to a causeuse. “Sit down; and now that I can speak, listen and advise me.” Lisa obeyed, and turned her earnest sympathizing eyes upon her sister with a look that invited confidence, such as Blanche was about to give,—a pure and unrestrained avowal of her feelings.

“You know, Lisa, that I met Mr. Stuart frequently at my aunt’s last winter. He is a great favorite with her, and the only one among her young men acquaintances whose actual intimacy she solicits. Whenever he came we were left together, naturally enough, while my aunt and uncle busied themselves, one with her housekeeping and the other with his papers. There was always a congeniality of tastes between us that led to an absence of any thing like ceremony, and something like confidence arose in our intercourse. There were books discussed that both had read, and many that I had never seen, which I was to like because he did. Wherever we went in the evenings he went. He was always there to draw my arm through his, and offer me the conventional attentions that became so delightful at length. We never spoke of love, Lisa; we never talked sentiment at one another, but it was impossible to deny that—that—”

“You loved one another,” said Lisa, seriously. She put on no arch looks, affected no jests—this was a grave subject to her.

“But we never said so, Lisa,” said Blanche, quickly. “We never said so; it was enough for us to be together. One morning I received a note from Helen Clarke, begging me go to her as she was very ill. My aunt’s carriage took me to Evergreen, and I remained a week absent. On my return I found that he had been summoned to his mother’s dying bed, and had hurried off an hour after the letter came, taking time only to see my aunt and bid her adieu. ‘He asked earnestly after you, Blanche,’ said she, smiling; ‘and your absence grieved him deeply, my love. But he left a message expressive of it all, and ended it with, Tell her, my dear Mrs. Bliss, that I will return as soon as I can, and she must not forget me.’ I could not forget him, Lisa; but I despise a love-sick girl as I do the plague; so I came home, determined to be happy again among you all. I would have been ungrateful, indeed, to mope at home where we all love one another—to pine for a stranger, while I had still all that made life so dear. Of course, he never wrote to me—my aunt heard occasionally from him, and the letter announcing his return, affected me deeply. Would he still be the same, or was there a change?”

“And there was none,” said Lisa, in a low voice. “I know that now, Blanche, though I did not dream of this before. Blind creature that I was, not to have felt that we must part after all!”

“I have read in his looks that there is no change, Lisa,” said her sister, growing pale. “I know that he will tell me so this very day, for he begged me to remain at home this evening to see him. But, Lisa, if you do not like him—if it grieves you too much to have me give up my home for his, say so at once, and I will never leave you.” Her lips quivered and her hand shook, but the voice was steady, and she looked at Lisa with her calm, clear eyes until she felt those fond arms once more thrown around her.

“Dear, generous Blanche!” murmured the sister; “did you think I could be so selfish? Love on, dear girl, and be happy; God knows you deserve it!”

And soon after there was a wedding and a departure. Forth from the bird’s-nest went the first fledgling, and the rest sorrowed at home until Time with its kind hand closed the wound at their hearts. There were gleams of sunshine in the sweet, fond letters that came with their tales of happiness and renewed assurances that Blanche loved her old homestead better than ever; with playful threats of jealousy from Kenneth himself, as he added his postscript now to one, and now to the other.

They were a long time gone, but all was repaid when Blanche returned and placed her first born in his grandsire’s arms. Poor baby! he was well-nigh crushed to death as the four aunts flew at him, but he grew used to the danger in time, and thus spared his mother a world of nursing and petting.

It was impossible not to love Kenneth Stuart—impossible not to admire him. He had all that high integrity, that unflinching honesty that a woman loves to lean on. Nothing could be more gentle in manner or more firm in purpose. He could be grave or gay whenever he was called upon; and his affection for his wife made him court that of her family that he might further minister to her happiness, so they all learned to love as well as reverence him, calling on him for advice or sympathy as on one another. He had none of that childish jealousy of their mutual fondness—none of that selfish longing to have her forget old ties for him. It pleased him to see that same unrestrained intercourse pervade their family meetings, to know that he had not stepped in to shadow the light of “days gone by;” and thus they dared once more to boast of their sunny hours and eternal spring. Mr. de la Croix sat in the old arm-chair, and listened to the pleasant voices of his children as of yore. Lisa went about her household duties with a firmer tread, Rose went from one to the other with her gentle cares, Kate flitted here and there, her merry eyes wandering around to read the wants of each and all, while Minnie skipped about and played tricks as usual, as incorrigible as ever, in spite of Blanche’s matronly admonitions.

“Brother Ken, may I have the dark-haired, dark-eyed cousin that Blanche talks so much about?” said she, seating herself at his feet. “I am thinking very seriously of the married state. I look at you and sister and conjugate the verb, j’aime, tu aimes, nous aimons, etc. I walk about with little Ernest, and practice baby songs, besides helping Lisa to fuss about house, and darned a most unnatural and unfatherly hole in papa’s socks this morning. I am perfectly recommendable, I assure you,” and she turned up her saucy face and looked at him with an attempt at gravity that was, as Kate said, “too absurd.”

“Young ladies of fourteen must not think of marriage,” replied Kenneth, with one of his peculiar smiles. “I have destined Paul to Kate, as Lisa and Rose eschew yokes, etc.”

“To Kate!” exclaimed Minnie, with a pout. “And am I to be sacrificed because I am fourteen? Unhappy me!”

“Don’t rave, Minnie,” cried Kate, with a gay laugh. “I’ll resign in your favor if you say so. My time has not come yet, nor my hero.”

“But he may come with this Louis le Desire, Kate, and in spite of your Arcadian dreams of shepherds and piping swains, you may succumb,” said Minnie, shaking her little hand at her sister.

“Have I lived to be told this?” cried Kate. “Of all people in the world, do I love piping swains?”

“To be sure you do, or you wouldn’t admire all those little china monsters under green trees and reclining on rocks that Miss Bobson crowds upon her tables. I’ve seen you gaze at them with an eye of love and inspiration, ten minutes at a time.”

“Yes, to keep serious while you sympathized with her about the tarnished officer that hangs over the mantle-piece.”

“Unnatural girl!” cried Minnie. “Is it possible that you laugh at the sorrows of others? While I listen with ready tears to the account of his loss at sea, you are making light of this sacred wo. You shall never deceive Miss Bobson again, Kate, for I shall warn her against the deceit of young ladies who have a passion for her porcelain, and draw her in a retired place the very next time she unbosoms the locket containing curls of ancient hair.”

“Minnie! Minnie!” cried Blanche, reproachfully, “is nothing sacred to you?”

“Nothing about Miss Bobson, of course,” was the reply of the heedless girl. “Do you wish to impose on me to pity her mawkishness?”

“To pity her age, Minnie, and her loneliness, if nothing else,” said Kenneth, gravely. “And also to respect her years.”

“Mercy on me! what have I done? Laughed at a ridiculous old maid, and drawn Kate into the snare. This is a mountain and a mole-hill, indeed.”

“Well, leave her out then, Minnie,” said Blanche, “and let us reprove you a little for laughing at everybody and every thing. I heard you this morning crying like Mrs. Simms, and you are too old now—”

“Too old!” cried Minnie, passionately. “Would to God that I might remain a child then, if I am to cease laughing as I grow older.”

“Laugh as long as you can, dear girl, but not so much at others. I want you to think more, Minnie; the world is not a paradise, and you must grow more reasonable to bear a further knowledge of it.”

“Pshaw! you have all thought for me until now, continue to do so until I get Paul, the expected, to do it forever. Come, Rose, for a race down the avenue in this lovely moonlight. I want some animation after these severe lectures.” And off they ran together, while the rest shook their heads in concert.

“She is too volatile,” said Kenneth, gently, “but she will be tamed down in time. You must not scold her for venialities like Miss Bobson again. Now please, dear Lisa, spoil me a little and get my candle, for I must write a letter to this very Cousin Paul of mine, before I sleep.”

And Paul Linden came. He was, as Blanche said, a handsome fellow, with dark eyes, and hair like the raven’s wing, a beautiful mouth and teeth, and the finest whiskers in the world. He was a frank, open, generous-hearted creature, full of kindly impulses, but impetuous and excitable, and much beloved by Mr. and Mrs. Stuart. This visit was one they had long wished for, as more than probably it was preparatory to his permanent settlement near them.

It was impossible not to feel flattered at the welcome extended him on his arrival at Mr. de la Croix’s, and before night, he was as much at home as though he had known them for years.

“I am bewildered with this paradise of houris, Kenneth,” said he, as they paced the long piazza. “Since my poor mother’s death, which took place, as you know, before I left college, I have never felt so completely domesticated among women, and the charm their society affords me is perfectly indescribable. How happy you are to have so pleasant a home.”

“Happy, indeed, Paul! They are a lovely group, and I consider myself peculiarly fortunate in being able to keep my Blanche here and preserve it entire. It would be a shame to break it up.”

“Blanche is a jewel in herself,” said Paul, affectionately. “I had no idea that there could be four more like her. What a lovely girl her sister Kate is! I think she is my favorite, Kenneth, if I may have one.”

And Kenneth thought the preference reciprocal, but kept his counsel until a better time, for Minnie’s voice was heard in the hall singing to the baby, and he smiled as he remembered how she pretended to practice nursery songs.

“Very well done, Minnie,” said he, as they paused at the door, and watched her graceful frolicks with Ernest. “You are really growing quite recommendable.”

“Now, brother Kenneth, if you do tell that!” cried she, blushing, “I never will speak to you again!”

“I shall not tell, then,” was the reply; “but in return for my discretion, you must go and ask Kate if she sewed the tassel on my smoking-cap as she promised.”

“To be sure I did,” said a pleasant voice, and Kate, tripping out of the parlor with the cap in hand, looked prettier than ever.

“Ah, thank you, dear Kate! now do keep Paul in a good humor while I go off to smoke my cigar. It would be ill-mannered to leave him alone.”

Kate smiled, and the walk on the piazza was changed for one down the avenue. It must have been a pleasant one, for the bell rang for tea, and they were still there watching the pale moon rise, and wondering within themselves how often they would enjoy the same exercise with the same pleasure.

They did not wonder long. Every evening there was a challenge from Paul Linden to some one, for a walk, and somehow or other they were all tired but Kate, and all too busy but Kate. It was not very long, then, before the silent leaves were witnesses to a plighting of faith between those two, and heard (if leaves can hear,) what Paul Linden thought, the softest music on earth—the low tones that told him the loss of sweet Kate de la Croix’s heart of hearts.

The leaves saw a strange ring glitter on her fair hand, and they were discreet—but not so the sisters. Minnie spied the little symbol of their united faith, and poor Kate told her secret amid tears and sobs. Even she was unhappy that night, as she remembered the burst of grief that followed its disclosure, and another bird went from the nest almost as soon as the wedding was over.

Mr. de la Croix smoked an unusual number of cigars the evening his daughter left, and the sisters tried to be cheerful; but there was not one that went to bed that night without going into Kate’s empty room to weep afresh. Lisa had to threaten to turn it into a rag-chamber before they could accustom themselves to pass it without entering and mourning its occupant as one never to return.

“Don’t be forever crying over Kate,” she would say; “she is coming back, and you had better wait till then and be happy.”

“But we miss her so, Lisa,” said Rose, as her large eyes filled.

“So do I, but you do not see me going about crying over an old glove or a scrap of writing as you do. And you cannot say that I love her less than the rest of her sisters.”

“Moreover, my dear girls,” said Kenneth, taking his seat among them, and lifting little Ernest on his knee, “your spirits affect your father’s. He feels the loss of his child, and you must all try to speak of her return and not of her departure. I know how much you feel Kate’s absence, but you must begin to look upon your separation as a thing that is to come one day. It is in the course of nature. There are three more to leave their home; how can you expect that all can be as fortunate as Blanche and Kate, who remain with you, as of yore. Paul’s business will probably detain him a year, but he will return to settle here with us, and we must look at the bright side of things as long as we can. I have been saying all this to Blanche who ought to be as reasonable as Lisa; and now I am come to beg you for your own sakes to bear inevitable trials with the fortitude that is so precious when you once attain it. Minnie wants scolding, I am afraid,” continued he, as he stroked her head fondly. “Why do you not play on the piano and sing as usual? The sound of music will enliven us all, and the mechanical exercise of those little fingers will occupy your mind after a while, particularly if you set to work with those études of Moschelles, of whose difficulty I have heard so much.” And he smiled so encouragingly that Minnie flew off to mind him, and soon after Mr. de la Croix come out of his room, saying he was glad to hear the piano going again. Minnie was rewarded fully when she saw him take his old seat and doze while she played; and she told Kenneth in confidence, that she was much obliged to him for the scolding, but he must not tell Lisa, because she might take advantage of it. And there came that night a long letter from Kate, that helped to comfort them all. Poor Kate! her return was destined to be a sad one, for on the route, her beautiful little girl, her darling Blanche, was taken sick, and drooped so rapidly, that when she reached home, there was no longer any hope.

Silently they folded her in their arms, and noiselessly they bent their steps to her own old room, and placed the little sufferer upon its bed. Its soft eyes turned lovingly to its stricken mother, who sat beside it in mute agony, as once more they all stood together and mourned over her. Poor, wretched mother! so young to be so sorrowed! How full of anguish was the appealing look she cast upon her father, as he gazed with all a parent’s suffering upon his bright, merry-hearted Kate.

All that human skill could do was done—all that tender watchfulness could effect; but the angels had gathered round, and were beckoning that little spirit away. Paler grew the pale cheek—dim the sweet, loving eyes; and the young mother bent over her beautiful child, in misery such as they know only who have laid these treasures in the grave.

“Oh God of heaven!” was her mournful cry, “thou hast taken the sunshine of my life! Darker and darker grows the world to me, as those loved eyes grow dim. Thou hast crushed me to the earth, oh God! raise me with faith in thy unerring wisdom, that I may not doubt thy justice! Oh, my treasured one! Oh, my more than life—what is life to me?”

Her husband turned and placed his hand in hers. She bowed her head upon it, as though to seek forgiveness, and once more raised it to look upon her darling. To the last those eyes had turned to her with a long, lingering look, but now Lisa was closing them in their eternal sleep, and the angels were bearing that pure, sinless one in triumph to their home.

With a loud, piercing cry, the childless mother fell back, and the sisters no longer restraining their grief, filled the house with their cries. Kenneth bore her out of the room, and returned for Paul, who stood gazing at his dead infant as one stupefied.

“Go to your wife, Paul,” said he; “go to poor Kate; your love alone can soften this heavy blow;” and he remained to bend and kiss the now stiffening form of the lovely little creature. “I will send Blanche to you, Lisa; you must not perform the last sad task alone. Alas! poor Kate! how my heart bleeds for you!”

He then sought Mr. de la Croix, who was wildly walking about the garden, muttering to himself in his grief for the grandchild he had never known, and the mother—his darling Kate. Kenneth remained to soothe him, and after persuading him to take some rest, returned to the house.

The little corpse was already in its grave-clothes, looking like sculptured marble as it lay extended on the couch. The long, shining hair was parted on the pure brow, and fell around its head like a shower of gold. Pale tea-roses were on its breast, and in those white, clasped hands, emblems of its purity and fragility. Lisa and Blanche were weeping silently over their lost pet, and Minnie’s screams, mingled with the more subdued cries of Rose, came mournfully through the air. This was the first sorrow of their womanhood, and the old homestead seemed desolate indeed, now that the iron had entered one young, fresh heart with its bleeding wound, its horrid void.

Kate came again to look upon her child. With Paul’s arm around her, she stood once more beside its still cold form. Raising her hands, she uttered a low moan that pierced the hearts of those around her.

“Oh, blessed babe!—my darling, my loved one! I see you for the last time! You that I have borne, that I have watched and cherished with more than a mother’s care; you that have given me so much happiness, so much pride; here is all that is left to me, and that must go into the cold earth to be seen no more! Those little arms that were folded around my neck; those little hands that clasped mine so lovingly, are mine no more! Those lips that never refused to kiss me, will meet mine no more! Oh God, no more! Why, ah why was I thus smitten to the dust? Why was she so surely mine—so tended and so watched? Why is she torn from the mother that idolized her?”

“That she might be spared your trials, my dear child,” said a voice; and they all made room, as a venerable-looking old man came and stood beside her. “That she might wear that crown of glory which even your care could not give her, and which she now treasures as you treasured her.”

Kate bowed her head and wept. In her grief she could not remember this, and she listened in silence as holy words were spoken to her, and promises held out that she might grow strong in faith. Her piety came to her as a blessing, and she leaned, poor, broken reed, upon the cross her Saviour bore, until her spirit, fainting from its weight of wo, could bear to look upward and say, “His will be done.”

The loved and the cherished was laid in her last resting-place, and her mother left to mourn and miss the care of her life. Affection and sympathy were given her, and no one seemed ever impatient with her constant grief. But she made an effort to be cheerful once more, and mingling in the usual pursuits of the family, found it easier than she had expected. Her husband’s unvarying gentleness, his watchful kindness were sources of much comfort to her bruised spirit, and she strove, poor, grieved one! to struggle with her grief. Time passed, though the wound was fresh and often bled, Kate had learned, for the sake of others, to appear happy and composed because she prayed for strength. But who could tell the fierce strife that was working in her heart? Who could dream of the hours passed in silent suffering, when sleep refused to visit her alone of that quiet crowd? When through the darkness she gazed, her spirit beckoning back the child, whose every look was treasured, whose very cry came upon her troubled soul; when she tortured herself into the conviction that it might have been saved; that she herself, poor, devoted creature, had not been the watchful nurse beside its sick bed. Oh! if these bitter thoughts are sent us as temptations—as trials of our faith in the mercy and justice of the Almighty, how often we are tried, how often in danger of falling!

And Kate struggled with a mighty strength against these terrible remembrances, going on as usual with her daily occupations, missing at each moment the beloved object of her care, but walking boldly on, not daring to look behind, lest her courage should fail her.

And thus she toiled and received her reward, as days went by, and she was able to look to Heaven alone as the haven for all who were wrecked upon the world’s wild coast. All seemed grateful to her for her resignation—all were kind and considerate; and she remembered that there was between herself and that “better land” a powerful link that nothing could destroy.

“I do not think that Rose is looking well, father,” said she one day, as she went into his room with her work, and seated herself at his side. “I wish you would observe her.”

Mr. de la Croix laid down his book with a look of alarm. Was another one of his crown of jewels to lose its brightness?

“I do not say that she is positively ill,” said Kate, “but there is a languor about her—an indifference to her usual enjoyments that I do not like. She requires change.”

“But what can be the matter with her, my dear child?” said her father, looking bewildered. “There must be a cause.”

“A cause that she is not probably aware of herself, but we cannot hope that Rose’s health will continue forever in the same perfect state, and as her disposition is different from the rest of us, her life has been a more sedentary one through that very difference. You know she rarely if ever goes out.”

“True, very true, my dear, I am glad you reminded me of this. Rose must have a change, and, strange to tell, this very day I received a letter from your Aunt Bliss, begging that I would let her have one of the girls this summer to accompany her.”

“But she goes to Europe, father!” exclaimed Kate.

“And that is the very thing for Rose, hard as it is to send her so far; but it will improve her in every thing. Send her here, my love, and tell Lisa to come with her.”

What surprised them all was Rose’s willingness to go; and they all agreed that she felt the necessity of being roused from her unusual state, to be thrown more on her own resources. Kate’s clear judgment had found out the evil, and proposed the remedy; and Rose’s eyes filled as she thought of her sister’s watchfulness in the midst of her grief.

The preparations for her departure were of great assistance to Kate, who busied herself diligently, and gave herself no time for thought. She accompanied her father and Rose to meet her Aunt Bliss, and as the steamer was detained a few days, remained to see her off.

It was a sad parting, for Rose had never been from home before; but she, timid bird, must try her wings like the rest, and though her flight was long, it would be a happy one; and when Kate and her father reached home, part of the sisters’ grief for Rose was lost in the delight of seeing her look so well—so much more like her former self.

The old homestead resumed its quiet tone, and its occupants their usual habits, more reconciled to their changes, more fit to play their part in the battle of life. No longer looking upon their hoard of bliss as secure, no longer expecting

they endeavor to prepare themselves to breast the storm, should sorrow come again upon the little band.

All but Minnie, her grief was violent and willful, refusing all comfort, rejecting the means of softening it while it lasted; but there was no change in her light volatile disposition; and Kate, poor Kate! wise from sad experience, lectured in vain.

“Where is Blanche?” said Lisa, coming in from the garden with her bonnet on. “Do you know Minnie?”

“Do I know? Yes; she’s hid in the moon, if you can’t find her; for that is where Ariosto says every thing is hid that is lost.”

“Pshaw, Minnie! do not be foolish. Where is Blanche?”

“Tell me what you want with her, and I will take a broomstick and ride after her then?” said the wild girl. “I must be paid for so much trouble before I undertake it.”

“I would you could promise to stay in the clouds a while and freeze your spirits into reason. But my wants are no secret or I’d never tell you, madcap Minnie. Go and find Blanche, and ask her for the key of the silver closet.”

“And that is all! I’m sorry I promised now, as the contempt I feel for the errand makes it disgraceful. But here I go, being honor itself about keeping promises.”

“Excepting those you make to become better and wiser,” rejoined Lisa, as she ran off. In an instant she was back.

“Lord bless us! She is in the library listening to Kenneth read Cosmos. I wish he’d put me to sleep sometimes, as I am sure he often does his wife.”

“I wish he would!” said Lisa, “and he would oblige others besides myself. Go and ask Kate to come down in the store-room and help me.”

“And what do you want with Kate in the store-room, Miss Lisa?” said Minnie, as she tied the key she held to the string of her bonnet. “There must be something going on that I cannot guess.”

“I want her to make an Italian cream for dinner, while I busy myself with something else that does not concern you.”

“On the principle of ‘Faut être deux pour avoir du plaisir,’ I presume,” said Minnie. “How affecting! But something is in the wind, Lisa, or you would not fuss over creams, etc. Is any one expected to dinner?”

“I give you permission to expect as many persons as you like,” replied she, with provoking gravity. “Tell me their names, and I will prepare the banquet.”

“I never saw such a mysterious old oracle as you are! Getting out more plate, more napkins, and steeping gelatin with so much solemnity, as though we never did have company in our lives before, then preserving such a dark cloud of silence on the subject! Kate! who is coming here to-day—tell me, and don’t be foolish about it?” cried Minnie. “Sister is enveloped in mystery and wont let me know.”

“Kate does not know herself,” said Lisa, smiling; “but may be she can guess.”

“This is Rose’s birth-day,” said Kate, after a pause, “and—”

“And I forgot it!” exclaimed Minnie, as she burst into a flood of tears. “The first one she ever passed away from home!”

“And the last, I trust,” said Kate, tenderly. “Poor, dear Rose! I wonder where she is now!”

“Enjoying herself very much, I suppose,” said Lisa, crushing a lump of sugar into her bowl of eggs, “and wishing we were all with her. She would be surprised at the idea of your crying about her, I dare say.”

Minnie made a step forward, and threw down a cup that was too delicate for such rough usage.

“There!” said her sister, “you have your day’s work before you. I never saw such a careless girl.”

“Never mind,” said Minnie, collecting the fragments, and smiling through her tears, “this will do to place among

that you keep on the shelf there. I’ll cement it for you.”

“Thank you! I wish you could mend some of your bad habits as easily as you promise to patch broken china. It would keep you busy for life.”

“Alas, poor Minnie!” said the girl, “how unjust the world is! What can I do?”

“Go and see that Sampson puts the dining-room in extra trim, and fill the finger-bowls,” said Lisa.

“Dear sister! I am not Dalilah, and cannot manage the strong hero of antiquity,” said Minnie, with affected humility. “But I will crown the bowls with orange leaves, and perform any other lowly task with much pleasure.” And she left the room singing a light song, that ever and anon fell sweetly on the ears of that united household as they paused to catch the tones of the young, rich voice.

“Mr. Selby and his nephew dine with us,” said Lisa, as she and Kate compounded their dessert together, “and as the latter is about to sail for Europe, papa has promised him letters for Uncle Bliss and Rose.”

“Indeed!” said Kate. “That will be very pleasant for them to see any one that can give such direct news of us. Do you remember to have seen young Mr. Selby, Lisa?”

“When he was a little boy, I saw him once at his uncle’s, but he has been at college for years past. He is now on a farewell visit, and will not return for some time, of course. I hope he will be like old Mr. Selby, for he is one of the kindest and most agreeable men I ever knew.”

“Yes, he is universally beloved. Paul esteems him highly, and often goes to him for advice.”

And Kate thought Paul’s opinion sufficient to determine the importance of the universe.

Minnie had her own ideas, and very soon found herself in merry conversation with Harry Selby, who devoted himself to his pretty neighbor at dinner with a zeal that made his uncle laugh.

“What is that, Miss Minnie? What did you say then?” asked he across the table.

“I was wondering, sir, if Mr. Selby will return a true hearted American, after seeing all the splendor and beauty of the old world,” replied Minnie, glancing at him with her bright eyes.

“Of course he will,” said the uncle. “Do you think now that any of the English blondes, the French brunettes, or the Italian signoras, will ever drive your saucy face out of his mind?”

Minnie blushed—so did Harry; but she parried the attack.

“Oh, he can easily forget me, for this is our first meeting, and will be the last; but there must be many persons whom he could not under any circumstances so wrong—yourself, for instance.”

Mr. Selby laughed. “And so you think that my ugly phiz will be the one to haunt a young fellow on his travels. Do him justice, Minnie, and give him credit for a dash of sentiment at least. Do you think him insensible to the charm of dark eyes and all that?”

“By no means, sir; but it would be impertinent on so short an acquaintance to attempt to fathom so mysterious a thing as a human heart, such as I suppose belongs to Mr. Selby.” And Minnie blushed again as a pair of large, brown eyes met hers with an unequivocal glance of admiration.

The owner of said orbs began something like a compliment; but there was an unnecessary tinkling of the ice in Minnie’s glass, and she did not appear to hear it. Besides, at that particular moment, Paul leant forward, and asked for some information about a planing machine; and the conversation turning on inch-boards, weather-boards, and thousands of feet of lumber, the ladies rose and left the table to adjourn to the parlor.

Harry soon followed them—what cared he for planing-mills? And Blanche made room for him by Minnie, the place he evidently wanted, for he never left it until his uncle called to her for some music, and a “good old song.”

Unfortunately for him, young ladies play too well now-a-days to require a book before them, and as there were no leaves to be turned, Harry stood at a distance, admiring the rapid little fingers as they flew over the ivory.

“Who taught you?” exclaimed he, as she ended Rosellen’s pretty variations from Don Pasquale, “who taught you?”

She pointed to Kate, who nodded her head with a proud smile.

“Is it possible! When I get to Paris, I shall boast of my countrywoman, Mrs. Linden, for I am confident—”

“But the song of Minnie, the song!” interrupted Mr. Selby senior. “I asked for a song, young lady.”

“I know it, sir, but I will leave that to the rest, as I can only boast of a few notes as yet.” And Minnie rose and gave her place to Blanche.

“Minnie does not like to show off unless she is sure of creating a sensation,” said Mr. Linden, laughing as she took her seat beside him. “If you did but know, Mr. Selby, what a wonderful debut she is prepared to make; all the young ladies will hide their diminished heads next year at her first Mazourka, and never dance again. Wont they, Minnie?”

“You flatter me,” said she, smiling good humoredly. “I only intend to be one of the stars—not the bright particular one, for I have only my wits to help me out.”

“And they will be all sufficient,” said old Mr. Selby, patting her cheek. “I’m sure of my little pet’s entire success in the great world of fashion. How many ball-dresses is Rose to bring across the wide ocean?”

“Oh, she has carte blanche,” returned she, “and I will send for you as soon as they are unpacked, that you may determine my first costume.”

But the evening wore away, and the family separated at an early hour, as the letters must be written to Rose for the next morning. Each had a volume to say, and Minnie’s exceeded the third page, as she had promised such faithful accounts of home to the wanderer, even the dogs were immortalized that night, for an affecting account of Ponto’s regret for his mistress drew tears from the writer’s own eyes.

“Lord bless us! what a correspondence,” exclaimed Mr. de la Croix, as the letters were thrown on the table. “Poor Rose will never get through it.”

“There’s a postscript from Kenneth, and myself, of course,” said Paul, as he threw down a pretty envelope. “An endless communication from Minnie, six pages between Blanche and Kate, two from Lisa, she being too sensible to waste time, and a well filled sheet from you, sir. Rose will have work and instruction for a week when all this reaches her. Did you have a good pen, Minnie?”

“To be sure I did,” replied she, looking up.

“Then I rejoice, for Rose’s sake, your calligraphy being at times very Egyptian. However, Harry Selby will take great pleasure in assisting her to decipher it, I dare say; and I feel much relieved on her account.”

Minnie pulled his hair for him at this declaration, and vowed revenge. Rose could read her writing very well, though others might be dull enough to suspect the contrary.

There was a charm about Minnie that was irresistible—it was her unvarying good humor, her sweet, even temper. Even while asserting her willful but childish dislike of reproof it was impossible to be angry with her. Nothing like an angry retort ever passed her lips; as ineffectual as a reprimand was to her wild spirit, she took it smilingly, and disarmed displeasure with her winning ways. No wonder that her sisters loved her; no wonder they feared for her as years passed, and she was yet untamed. Impulsive, obedient to these impulses, and inconstant in her tastes, Minnie de la Croix, at the age of seventeen, was no wiser than a child of ten. If she offended she was wretched until she had been forgiven, and as ready to pardon as she was averse to wound. Her life had been one of sunshine and love; but she was growing up to womanhood, and dreamed not of its perils and its pains—saw nothing but smiles and fair promises in the world before her.

Rose’s account of young Selby’s arrival in Paris was satisfactory to all parties. “He came to see us,” wrote she, “as soon as he arrived, taking time only, as I suppose, to make himself look remarkably handsome under a French valet’s hands. He greeted me most affectionately, and I verily believe would have kissed me upon slight encouragement. He gave me news of my dear home, of my dearest father and sisters; and if he had been as ugly as a Chinese, I should have thought him an Adonis. He tells me that you are all in perfect health, and describes my Minnie as something very lovely. Very bewitching, he said, and so very pretty. My resemblance to her seemed to delight him; but as I am neither of the two epithets bestowed upon her, I am afraid it will wear off. We were at the Opera last evening, and, of course, he joined us; but there was no time to talk when Jenny Lind was singing, and I could not have heard him if he had attempted it, I was so absorbed; but he had too much taste for such a mistake. We spend this evening at the American Minister’s, where I am to see a whole cage of French lions; and what is better, some of my own dear countrymen. I am delighted with the grace and ease of the Parisian ladies—it is impossible to resist their fascination of manner, the very lifting of their veils is a tableau in itself. Minnie’s numberless dresses for next winter I shall choose under the surveillance of one of our new acquaintances, one of the presiding goddesses of fashion, whose taste is so infallible, that, if she were to have her bonnet bent by accident, bent bonnets would suddenly become the rage.”

We cannot give all Rose’s letter, as it was a long one, but must hurry over her return, and bring her home in time for Minnie’s ball, as the whole house called it. The dear absentee arrived in the midst of the preparations, at the time appointed. Mr. de la Croix wished to celebrate her happy return among them with Minnie’s debut, and there was no end to the joy of the sisters as they all met together once more in the room wherein Rose’s boxes and trunks had been carried. Mr. Linden was there with a hammer, which he swung over their heads, as he called out where he was to begin, and the door opened to admit Mr. de la Croix, Kenneth, and Harry Selby’s uncle. Minnie had promised, he said, that he should choose her costume upon this great occasion, and here he was, to do his duty conscientiously.

He was gladly welcomed, and Paul fell to work on a large caisse, according to Rose’s directions. The lid flew off and revealed a very mysterious covering of white paper, which they proceeded to remove, and Lisa’s nice hands were called upon to take out the beautiful dresses that lay so lightly one upon the other.

“Beautiful!” they cried, as a blue tarlatan of the most delicate shade was held up. “Exquisite! Who is this for?”

“For Lisa,” said Rose, displaying its beauties; “and I have the most unexceptionable bouquets of pink moss roses for the looping of the skirt, sleeves, and one for the bosom. Now that white dress is for Blanche—my Lady Blanche—and the two rose-colored for Minnie and myself. All have flowers to trim alike. You will find Kate’s in the other box—there was no room for it in this one.”

“Here is another white one,” said Minnie, who had danced around the room in a perfect glee. “Whose is it?”

“That is yours also, Minnie,” answered Rose, with an affectionate smile. “You will want more than one ball-dress, my little debutante. Then—here Paul! Paul! to your duty—open this box. Mr. Selby! you have something to do with this, sir.”

All eyes turned to him as he came forward with a queer smile from the window at which he and Mr. de la Croix sat looking on, and enjoying the scene of gayety and confusion that passed before them.

“What have I to do with boxes, my pretty Rose,” inquired he. “I sent for no coats or pantaloons?”

“But you sent for the contents of this box, Mr. Selby,” said she, nodding her head significantly. “What they are, I know not; but Harry asked me to let it come on with my baggage, as it was yours, and to be opened at Oakwood. So here it is, and as I have some curiosity about it, I call upon this self-constituted carpenter to gratify it.”

Down went Paul’s hammer and chisel, and the nails gave way. More white paper—and many little tape-strings running across, busied Lisa’s fingers for some minutes. At length she drew out a dress so beautiful that even Mr. de la Croix came forward. It was of a most delicate texture, white, and embroidered around the skirt in palms of silver. Nothing could be more exquisite, and Lisa drew forth gloves and slippers to correspond. There was still a small box lying within, but as every one was exclaiming over the shining robe, she deferred taking it out until it was time.

“Now, Mr. Selby! Mr. Selby! what did you want with this dress? Tell us quickly—are you going to be married?”

“Not unless Minnie will have me, for it is hers,” said he, covering her with the lovely thing, and looking half ashamed as she uttered a scream of delight.

“I see a letter there for me—hush child! hush! don’t mention it, that’s a good girl—I’m quite rewarded by your pleasure; let us read Mr. Harry’s communication.” He broke the seal and began reading it aloud.

“My dear uncle, Madame de Rosiere went to the modiste’s with me, and chose these articles as you requested; being as perfect in taste and dress as she is in wit, it must be a gem, almost worthy of the fair creature for whom it is destined. (Hem! Harry is eloquent.) As I knew where Miss de la Croix had her dresses made, Madame de R. went with me there, and arranged it all with the ingenuity of a Frenchwoman—that this was to be made and packed with the rest, though in a separate box, and sent to Mr. Bliss’s hotel, when I asked him to take charge of it according to your orders. It gave me the greatest pleasure to attend to your commission, I do assure you, and I must thank you for it. How I long to see your favorite in a costume that seems to my poor eyes, one that will robe her like an angel of light. (Hurrah for the boy! he is really a gone case.) In the small box you will find a—” here Mr. Selby muttered the rest to himself, and ended with “your affectionate nephew, etc.”

The old gentleman then took out of a satin case a fan so superior to any Minnie’s unpracticed eyes had ever seen, that her admiration knew no bounds. On the slender gold ring that passed through the handle was her name in full, and to a chain of fine workmanship was attached a ruby for her taper finger.

“Minnie is a spoiled child,” said her father, taking the costly bauble and examining the pretty painting upon it, an acquisition in itself. It represented a young girl in the first bloom of youth with her arm around the neck of a beautiful greyhound, that looked up wistfully in her face. The attitude was full of grace, not unlike Minnie’s own, and Rose smiled as she remarked that Mr. Selby had chosen an emblem of fidelity for her little sister’s study during ball-room scenes.

“More probably as an example,” said his uncle, with a meaning smile. “Harry can never be classed among that portion of his sex, ‘to one thing constant never,’ and he, in my humble opinion, would love to communicate some of the same spirit to others.” A sly glance at Minnie accompanied these last words; but she was examining her fan very closely, and did not perceive it. At length she went and laid her hand upon his arm, looking up at him with a grateful expression.

“You have been so very kind to me—so thoughtful of my enjoyment in the world, that I cannot thank you in words. Some of these days, like the mouse proved to the lion, I may find a way to serve you, but until then you must believe how deeply I feel all this attention. Now come and choose my costume for to-morrow night—shall I come out in all the splendor of my white and silver?”

“No, my dear,” said Mr. Selby, kindly. “You must be like Rose to-morrow, and wear the other when my sister gets my old-fashioned house in readiness for another party, where you will receive the guests as your own. Now let me kiss that soft cheek, and run away to my business in town.”

“And not see all my presents, Mr. Selby!” exclaimed Rose. “They cannot equal yours, but I have some very choice specimens of porcelain, besides collars, capes, etc. Now look at this transparent lamp-shade, with the angels’ heads; and see these vases. Here is a coffee-cup for papa, one for Paul and Kenneth, with their initials, and here is an inkstand for my darling Kate.”

“And what is for Lisa and Blanche?” asked he, admiring each as she presented them.

“The lamp is for my industrious queen bee, Lisa, the vases for Blanche, and things innumerable for the rest. You do not care about seeing the ‘dry goods,’ I know, but wait until I show you some of my own work. I have embroidered three vests for my three pets—papa and ‘the brothers,’ besides a scarf for my friend, Mr. Selby.”

He was delighted at the idea of being remembered by her while in a distant land, and Rose was forced to send him away to get rid of his thanks.

They hurried over the rest of the unpacking, as many preparations were needed for the next day’s fête, and were soon running about from one room to the other, laughing and singing as in days gone by.

[Conclusion in our next.

A BALLAD OF THE WOODS.

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BY GEO. CANNING HILL.

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BY J. M. LEGARE.

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(Continued from page 236.)

After the battle in which De Haye, the maître-de-camp was killed, and the Portuguese ran away to a man, leaving the French to maintain the honor of the day and their ultimate position on a hill near at hand, the Spanish army unbuckled their armor and sat down to stretch their limbs beside the fires at which their suppers were cooking; and if any one in camp lost appetite that evening, it was not because of the numberless gaping wounds witnessing to Heaven against him from the field behind. A mile or so above, a few scattered lights showed where the remnant of De Chaste’s army held ground, and awaited the morrow with little fear but much hunger, sending to perdition the viceroy and entire Portuguese nation the last thing before dropping to sleep: midway between these two rows of fires, was neither life nor light save such as a crescent moon gave, and as much as lingered in some poor wretch with more vitality than was best for him. In which middle space the Damon and Pythias of this story, Hilo and Carlo, prowled about, turning over the stiff carcasses in search of valuables, for nothing of convertible worth came amiss to the pair, whose personal property was staked nightly at dice. Occasionally an apparent corpse tossed about his arms and legs convulsively, or prayed in a husky whisper for a little water, for life and mercy’s sake a single draught; but in either case the Walloon, like a rough angel of mercy as he was, put an end to their anguish promptly, saying with a grin to Hilo—“You know it’s for his good I do it: if he drank any thing it might keep him alive till somebody who aint his friend comes round. It would be a heap harder to die after making up his mind he was to live again, wouldn’t it?”

To which Hilo replied with some contempt: the boy was ferocious, as has been elsewhere said, only on provocation—

“You’re fitter for a hangman than a soldier, serjeant.”

A truth Wolfang took for a compliment.

“Hey?” cried that cidevant free-captain suddenly, “here’s one of our officers, let’s turn him over. A hole in the back of his casque by Lucifer; it served him right for turning his back on the enemy.”

Hilo may have recognized the whereabouts sufficiently to make a tolerably fair guess before the other added:

“Oh—oh—the maître-de-camp, De Haye!” But if he did he held his peace, and assisted in ridding the dead cavalier of a few personals.

The Walloon was thick-skulled, but his long service in villany had increased his cunning as a matter of course, and a duller man than he, acquainted with Señor de Ladron’s peculiarities, might have jumped to a like conclusion.

“Bah! he wasn’t a coward after all. The arquebuse that sent this ball was behind him while he faced the Dons. The man you owe a grudge to had better keep awake, Hilo, my lad.”

“You’re a fool,” Hilo returned. “Hold your tongue. Do you wish to bring the Spaniards upon us with your noise?”

To which the other answered sullenly—“You talk as if I wasn’t more than your slave. You’d better mind what you’re about. I aint going to stand it always, even if—here now, what’s to be done with these papers?”

“What is that shining in your hand?”

“A locket, or something of the sort, he had in his breast. Hang it, you want every thing!”

“A locket!” cried his comrade quickly. “Give it here.” Which the other did unwillingly, and the other pocketed after holding it up to the light. Hilo’s mood up to this moment had been none of the sweetest, as the captain could testify, but some virtue existed in the appropriation which was quite irresistible.

“Come, old fellow,” he cried to the serjeant, in high good-humor, “I was rather sharp with you just now, wasn’t I? You know I’m quick and all that, and musn’t mind me. Here’s a handful of ducats for your locket, as you found it; I fancy the thing, and don’t grudge paying for it.”

A gift the captain took with a growl half of resentment, for he had not found a charm for himself, and could not so easily forget an offense as his master.

It was wonderful what a dog to fetch and carry that uncouth animal was to Hilo; how he followed him about, drew dagger in his service, and exposed his life any time rather than suffer the latter to embark alone in a perilous venture, a thing his youthful friend was much given to. It would have been an unanswerable proof of the existence in all men of some good trait, some capacity to love a brother, for a worse rogue than the captain would be difficult to select. But, unhappily, this Netherlandish Damon had sounder, if less sentimental, reasons for sticking by his Pythias. Hilo, a wonderfully precocious youth, had fallen in with the honest captain some three or four years back, and dexterously turned to his personal advantage a comfortable sum brought over from Peru by the other. “I like the boy, he’s full of pluck. I’ll school him into the ways of the world, look ye,” the captain used to say, at the very time his protégé was scheming to possess his ingots.

“I knew his father in Peru very well, a man of money. He lent me a helping hand once, and I don’t mind turning about and lending the boy any thing I have,” he spoke later. And so, not because of the helping hand, as the captain wished understood—which, to be sure, was Carlo’s beginning in life, the elder De Ladron having taken him into temporary partnership in the matter of a forced repartimiénto which turned out golden—but because he had entire reliance in the magnitude of the senior’s estate, he made over to Hilo the bulk of his possessions, on conditions legally witnessed, of a fourfold return immediately on the other’s receiving his own. No doubt Hilo acted in good faith, less from inclination possibly than necessity, his money affairs having become rather intricate about that time, and there could be no question of the repayment of the full amount—the original was no trifle—at the season specified.

But when was that to arrive? A question Carlo asked himself with growing dissatisfaction not long after the last ducat had slipped through his debtor’s fingers. Hilo was in no hurry to marry the girl, and since signing the captain’s bond, had bestowed his affections elsewhere, as people say. A French countess, black-eyed and brisk, took his fancy much more than the blonde his betrothed, and during the stay of the French embassage at Madrid, the young gentleman was on good behavior—ostensibly at least. Of all her gallants none excited his jealousy so much as a cavalier who had accompanied the count unofficially, and stood high in his daughter’s favor.

Don Hilo’s way of removing an obstacle of this sort, was admirably illustrative of his sense of wrong, although sometimes, as in this instance, liable to miscarry. He first picked a quarrel with De Haye, and that gentleman refusing point-blank to fight so disreputable a party, was waylaid and killed by proxy in the person of Villenos, who was of much the same figure, and, as it chanced that night, similarly attired. The eclat of this mistake, added to the departure of the lady, took him to France, where information of De Haye’s joining the commandant induced him to enlist under the same knight’s pennon, in pursuance of his vengeful purpose, and the young blood-hound was of course nothing molified by the remonstrance of his enemy to De Chaste on shipboard, which Carlo repeated with some little exaggeration, to be expected from the mouth of so affectionate a friend.

The heavy, cunning, ex-free-captain was brow-beaten and domineered over by his former protégé in a truly surprising manner to one not in the secret. It was wonderful how much he bore, how assiduously followed at the heels of his junior when off duty, uneasy at losing sight of the latter. The truth was, the captain having gambled and squandered himself into poverty again, looked to the money to be derived from Hilo’s fortune for a means of reputable living, as he said.

“I was an honest soldier till I met that Hilo!” was his lament years after, while awaiting the hour of his execution. And it was the obduracy of the same young gentleman, aided by his own failure to win the heiress, which had reduced him to the necessity of relying upon Hilo’s attaining his twenty-fifth year and sole right of property; a fib, by the way, of the party interested, which the captain was by this time too near gone not to catch at with proverbial eagerness.

“If I can only keep him in sight,” he used to think fifty times a day with an oath, “until I get back my ducats, I’ll take pay for my dog’s life;” and at nights he would wake muttering the words and feeling the edge of his weapon, when Hilo would exclaim—“Can’t you leave off grinding your tusks in that savage fashion, you Dutch boar!”

The captain saw how a little misadventure in the shape of his dear young friend’s decease, might deprive him of all chance of restoration, and no mother could be more precious of her charge: Hilo might involve himself in difficulties and be slain in a brawl; it was this worthy soul’s chief business to guard against such a mishap, or extricate him when fairly in: or he might fly into an ungovernable rage and harm himself, or tempt the captain into doing so; so the latter eschewed all cause of contention, and humbled himself where humility became a necessity. For Carlo’s phlegmatic temperament was incapable of fear, and nothing would have gratified him more than a bout with the young gentleman—who, seeing his advantage, or from mere recklessness, tried his ability to bear and forbear to the utmost limit.

“Wait till I get my ducats back!” Wolfang consoled himself with muttering under his breath on such occasions, champing his jaws and keeping his fingers stalwortly from his dagger-hilt.

The pair were standing over the body of the maître-de-camp, Carlo with the papers in his hand taken from the breast of the dead lieutenant’s doublet, when Hilo cried:

“Hark! the camp is in motion yonder above. Come, Wolf, stir your clumsy legs before we are missed.”

And Wolfang trotting after his master thrust the crumpled missives into his own doublet—“It’s no use to throw away any thing in the dark,” he said; “I did a note of hand once so, and somebody else got the good of it; one of these days I’ll find time to spell it out”—where they remained many days, now and then taken out and returned, without much progress made in their elucidation, for the warlike captain was not much of a scholar, and found opportunity for only cursory examinations.

A destination very different was the captain’s pocket, it may be remarked, from that designed by the writer, Don Pedro, who, about the time Carlo pocketed the letters, was conversing with Señor Inique as to their efficiency in De Haye’s hands.

No man is absolutely penitent at the start; some fear for character, personal safety, or the like, is the prime mover, after which—it may be moments or years after—enters in a godly sorrow for sin committed. Sift your motives, exemplary reader, and satisfy yourself for once, your conscience is not the tender prompter to your most virtuous deeds you imagine: something to the effect, what it, or the world, or the church, or your wife at home will think, has its due influence. Human nature is not to be taken to task on this account; we are all more selfish than we choose to admit even to ourselves, or there would be an end straightway of all murders, thefts and villanies great and small and of every kind; and there is so little native good in us it is best not to cavil at the source of any redeeming trait, whatever it may be.

So Don Augustino after ten years’ penitence of fear, made confession for the first time of the same; not with the best conclusion or purpose in view, it may be objected, but the honest knight’s expressions of opinion were scarcely adapted to producing a better feeling at the beginning. Sir Pedro thought as much himself when he reviewed the conversation, and his after arguments were such as the mild expression of his fine gray eyes lent effect to, a thing they very seldom did when his speech was pointed with sarcasm. The soldier was first molified, then thoroughly subdued, and in the end inclined to adopt the counsel of his ancient companion-in-arms, who now, as always, took the shortest available course to the doing away of a bad deed by substitution of a good. Not that all this ripening of virtue in the veteran sinner’s breast was much hastened by the knight’s eloquence; it was mainly by the inexplicably swift thaw after the ice has been broken through with throes of dissolution, and something the knight’s words may have done at the beginning to aid the breaking up, something at the end to temper the freshet. What he saw when he entered the inner cabin of Inique’s ship, of that blank face and imbecility, I have nothing to relate; let the door remain shut upon him as it was in Inique’s time, and all likeness and constraint of the unhappy inmate be left to the imagination.

Entire restitution of name and property on one side, and public avowal of his paternity on the other, was what the straight-forward adviser urged, and Inique consented ultimately to perform. Avowed penitence strangely humbled the misshapen pride of the man. Once he said:

“You were right, Padilh; I was a coward from first to last. I begin to perceive there are two sorts of courage, one infinitely superior to the other, and God alone knows how much braver than I this poor boy might have proved.”

The main obstacle now to be overcome was the will of the supposititious Hilo, whose rage at finding himself heir to nothing would be likely to exceed all bounds.

“It must be opened gently,” said the knight. “The boy has an ill name for violence, and some gain must be shown as an equivalent for so much pecuniary loss; which last, I fear, will be the chief occasion of regret with him.”

“I have some little property of my own remaining,” answered the other, “and would gladly relinquish it in his favor, but for the claims of my other child. As for me, I am sick of this world’s honors—”

“Pooh!” cried Padilh cheeringly, “is this your new-found bravery? Look how you retreat before the enemy, and hope to shelter yourself behind a wall with monks. And as for your blue-eyed daughter, have no concern at all, for by this time I am sure that motherless countess of mine would stand a siege rather than surrender her unconditionally: we have more than we want in property and less in children, so you and I can each satisfy the other’s need and our own pleasure, which will be stealing a march at the start.”

The man of care and crime was sensibly touched by this offer.

“Many thanks!” was all he said, but he took his associate by the hand with a grasp that would make you or I wince.

“I think with you; he must be appealed to indirectly at first, that his suspicions may not be awakened too soon,” Don Pedro said shortly after, in answer to Inique. “In the French camp is a gentleman whose honor is unquestionable, and who entertains such friendship for me, he would not hesitate to undertake the service. If you do not oppose the design, I will write him a short narrative of the events, leaving the manner and time of communication to his judgment to determine. Until his jealousy of your present purpose is overruled, we may scarcely hope to meet the wretched boy in person, and I can see no better way of gaining our end.”

“Let it be so, I oppose nothing honorable,” replied the maître-de-camp.

“I am not referring to my old scale of honor,” he added presently, with something like a blush. There is hope for the man, thought Padilh thereupon; which was true enough.

The knight wrote the letter in accordance with this agreement, a brief recapitulation of the events of Inique’s life and his own, many of which De Haye already knew, urging that cavalier to use his discretion in acquainting the false Hilo de Ladron with so much of the truth as would suffice to induce an interview, by assuring him of no harm being plotted against his person, but rather some gain intended. Which letter Don Pedro contrived to have placed in De Haye’s hands the night before the battle in which the latter fell by the arquebuse of the boy whose cause he had at heart; for very nearly the last thought of this generous fellow, forgetting the enmity of Hilo, and perhaps rather careless of his rivalry even when disencumbered of the Señorita Inique, was that, after the day’s work was over, he would play the ambassador to what purpose he might: but it was Capt. Carlo that returned to camp with the letter instead.

The gallant captain hurrying back with his gay companion, found preparations making for a night attack, which were, however, countermanded before the column began the descent. The men had had their fill of fighting for the day, and turned in again wondering and grumbling at the useless disturbance. Meanwhile the commandant and the viceroy were discoursing of what had best be done, in the former’s tent. Senhor de Torrevedros, after the battle, had arrived with about a thousand of his countrymen, and one fourth or so the number of cows.

“The viceroy has brought milk for his babies at last,” the French soldiers said sarcastically; and the officer on duty who announced the arrival to De Chaste, prefixed an epithet to the count’s title by no means delicate or complimentary.

“In the devil’s name, sir count,” the commander exclaimed, with a red spot in either sallow cheek, “do you fetch these cattle to mount your cuirassiers or feed our troops?”

“Neither, at present, Senhor Commander,” the unabashed viceroy replied; “for in neither way could they so much benefit you as in their present condition.”

“Speak your mind freely, we are friends here, sir count,” the commandant answered coldly.

“Our valor is too well known to be questioned—second only to that of the French nation,” the count said braggartly, lifting his plumed cap by way of salute; “and I bring you, Senhor Commander, what no man may cavil at, a thousand men brave as lions and pledged to fall in defense of their king’s honor.”

At which speech a sarcastic smile passed round the group of attentive officers.

“Bah!” cried one to his comrade, “the fellow’s talk sickens me. Let’s go to sleep again, there will be nothing but gabble to-night.” And the two strode away. “Stay,” whispered the more curious, “we must hear the end of this bull story.”

Regardless of all which the viceroy continued.

“Yet, sir, on the word of a knight, these long-horned cows you affect to despise are more to be relied on as allies than twice the number of men I bring.”

“Doubtless,” the veteran rejoined, stroking his grizzled beard.

“I understand your double meaning, Senhor de Chaste,” Torrevedros said, slightly disconcerted. “But had you been present at a former descent of the Spaniards, when we routed five hundred infantry by driving half the number of wild cows upon them, you would not scoff at my design.”

“What! prove ourselves boors, and go to battle behind a herd of cattle with goads for lances!” here broke in the commandant with great indignation. “By St. Dennis and the devil, sir count, sir viceroy, you make my old blood boil to hear you talk. And I tell you once for all before these gentlemen here present, whose scornful laughter, as you may see, is only restrained by their good-breeding, that your offer in no respect suits the style of warfare practiced by knights and Frenchmen, although it may serve the purpose of cowards and Portuguese.”

“Take care! sir commandant,” cried the governor threateningly, stung to anger; “take care what you say in the hearing of a knight of that nation.”

“I have said my say,” the sturdy soldier answered shortly, turning his back on the speaker and stalking into his tent, where the other followed him after some consideration.

There the two commanders conversed at length, and with rather more harmony than the beginning promised; for De Chaste was not apt to bear a grudge long, and the smooth Portuguese would have kissed the other’s shoes if no other way offered for saving his precious life and limbs. The former, apart from his chivalric prejudices, and weighing the proposal simply as an expediency, refused to permit the employment of the horned reinforcement.

“They might as readily be turned against our battalions,” he justly remarked, “as Philip of Macedon’s elephants were, in some battle I’ve forgotten the name of.”

The commandant probably meant Pyrrhus, but his vocation being arms, not letters, he need not be undervalued by recent graduates who know better. One thing was now clear, the French had only themselves to look to, since the long expected recruits of the viceroy turned out to be a herd of cows, and a night attack was secretly ordered, which recalled the captain and Hilo to camp, but which the return of the count and his expostulations caused to be abandoned.

“You can learn nothing of the force and real position of the enemy, what obstacles lie between, nor who can guide you,” urged the alarmed governor plausibly; “and as for my men, I know not one who will be bribed or forced into a position so perilous.” Which appeared so truthful that the fiery Frenchman, with as bad a grace as any of his subordinates, betook himself to bed again after personally making the round of the Portuguese camp. All these swore by all the saints to stand to their posts. They were terrible fellows, fire-eaters and the like, at their own showing; but the commander was scarce asleep when Torrevedros reappeared with a confused air and the information that the entire division had stolen off and dispersed. Where the French general consigned his allies need not be repeated to polite ears, and I think his confessor, if he had one, should by no means have ordered a severe penance for what he said under provocation so grievous. A council of the chief cavaliers was immediately called. Alas! the most chivalric of them all lay at the foot of the hill without a word to offer.

The count spoke first, and strongly advised retreat to a higher mountain, by which the approaches to the interior might be readily defended, and an abundance of ammunition and provisions could be carried there, with cannon enough to maintain the position.

“Rather let us throw ourselves into the fortress of Angra,” cried Duvick, “Where, with our handful of Frenchmen, we can defy the whole Spanish army, backed by every Portuguese in the Azores.”

This speech drew a murmur of assent from the council, but the viceroy answered with his usual treacherous suavity.

“There is nothing to fear from my countrymen on that score, Messires.”

“No, by the Mass!” cried half a dozen voices, with some sardonic laughter; and the count turned to the commandant again, biting his lip with suppressed rage.

“Do as you please, Senhor de Chaste,” he said, with as much calmness as he could assume. “You are all masters here, I perceive, but I warn you fairly beforehand, that the walls of Angra are no better than a nut-shell, and the cannon of the marquis will bring them down upon your hot heads in less than twelve hours. Moreover, the place can contain not more than two hundred soldiers, as Heaven is my witness.”

Which was as great a fib as ever knight told, but quite as excusable as many, you ladies, are in the habit of telling by proxy at all hours of the day and at your front doors. I cannot see, for my part, how the Count de Torrevedros could possibly have acted otherwise under the circumstances, which approached as nearly as any military predicament may a civil, the not at home of mesdames out of toilette. In short, the count had that same night sent the keys of Angra by a trusty messenger to the Marquis of Santa Cruz, with his complimentary offer of services; an errand which the astute ambassador acquitted himself of to admiration, by leaving out the count and assuming the credit: and at the same moment the viceroy was giving his disinterested advice, no less a personage than Don Augustino Inique was marching in with five hundred men through the wide-open gates of the fortress.

This the commandant learned by daybreak the next morning, at which early hour he was pushing for the mountains in accordance with the advice of Torrevedros, who had gone ahead, as people say taking French leave. At the village of Nostre Dame Dager de Loup, they heard further that the governor had put off in a boat from the coast; and the French army, debarred from the sea on one side and Angra on the other, and now openly deserted by the Portuguese, occupied the little town and began immediately to throw up intrenchments before the arrival of the Spaniards.

“We must not think longer how best to live, but most honorably to die,” De Chaste answered a few of his young officers who grumbled at the want of necessary stores. A fine, heroic answer, which stopped the mouths of those high-spirited gentlemen, but was less efficient in the case of the soldiery. It must be confessed the estimable pair Hilo and the serjeant were not a little responsible for this discontent; hard work agreed with neither of their constitutions, and before nightfall they had found opportunity to exchange their views on the subject.

“I’d as lief be a galley-slave and be done with it,” the serjeant muttered to Hilo, who was helping him lift a load of sand out of the ditch.

“Captain,” returned the other, “you speak my mind; and things are getting in such a state here the sooner we draw our necks out of the noose the better.”

“Good,” replied Carlo, “but how is that to be done, look you? The marquis will hang us up for spies if we go over to them, and the count they say has gone off in the last boat on this coast.”

“But what if most of these Frenchmen went out with us?”

“That alters the case,” cried the captain with his old grin.

And somewhere about midnight the commandant was roused by an uproar round the officers’ quarters, which shewed what willing soil the ringleaders had found to sow sedition in.

“Kill your captains! I’ll begin with mine,” the serjeant was roaring with a volley of oaths, and menacing Captain Curzon with his halbert. The fellow had found drink somewhere, and was raging like a worried bull, his prominent bloodshot eyes sustaining the resemblance.

Curzon parried the thrust and would have cut him down, when the voice of the commandant overtopped the clamor.

“What!” he exclaimed, “do you plot to follow our Portuguese allies! Go, every man of you who chooses; we want none but brave men here, and will bear with no others.”

“That may do for you to prate about, general mine,” answered Señor de Ladron scoffingly, the seditious talents of that young gentleman causing him to be chosen captain of the insurgents, “but it wont deceive men with their eyes open, hark ye! We all know you’re only waiting a chance to escape with your brave officers, and leave us to pull an oar apiece in the Spanish galleys. Ha, ha! M. de Chaste! Begone while you’re allowed, for you see you’re outwitted.”

“Insolent dog, to your quarters!” the knight cried, advancing upon the speaker and striking him with his sheathed sword.

But Hilo, instead of falling back, foaming with rage, seized a halbert with both hands, and was as promptly fastened on by a dozen embracing arms.

“No, by St. Dennis! the general shan’t be harmed!” as many more voices exclaimed. “Only we’ll be ahead of him and go first.”

“Friends,” answered De Chaste, with some indignation in his voice, “you hurt me more by your suspicions than if you ran a sword through my body; and I take Heaven to witness, I will be the last man to quit this island, and will die rather than abandon any of you to the mercy of the marquis, whose countrymen gave such instance of their treatment of the French last year in the Floridas. Let fifty or a hundred of you surround my house yonder, and insure my stay: it will be time enough to dishonor yourselves and nation when I set the example.”

Which the mutineers did for the present, despite the taunts of their leader-elect, who, struggling furiously with his captors, had all the while been calling to the others to fall upon the officers, or loose him and he would give them example. The commandant was a favorite with the troops.

“We will wait until to-morrow,” they agreed among themselves, “and general or no general, he is a dead man if he lifts a finger to betray us.”

Señor Hilo de Ladron, for his part, came to the conclusion, after this failure, that the French camp was no place for him, and communicated his views to his faithful Damon.

“I’d like to have split his head open, he hadn’t so much as a cap on to save it,” he said to Wolfang, “and then we might have done as we pleased with the rest. But, hang it, you’re such a liar, the men only half believed the story from the first, and letting him talk upset their resolution altogether. It’s his turn now, and we must get out of this hornet’s nest before daylight.”

“Where to go?” the captain asked.

“If you are born to be drowned, you can stay behind, you wont be safe otherwise,” Hilo answered indifferently. “I’m for the mountains at first, and who knows but I may find it to my interest in the end to visit the marquis with the count for sponsor.”

“Oh, if you keep such good company,” the captain returned, with a grotesque bow and grin showing his comprehension of Hilo’s plans, “I’m your excellency’s humble servant!” And in an hour’s time these fast friends had slipped through the line of sentries, scaled the breast-work, and sat down to wait for light a mile or two from camp.

The impossibility of hearing ordinary discourse at that distance will cause the finale of this story to be very different from what it might have been under more favorable circumstances. For a herald, or courier, or valet, had just then arrived from the camp of the marquis, at the intrenchments, bringing a letter to the Commandant de Chaste, who presently sent through the village to find Don Hilo, as we all know now, without success.

[To be continued.

———

BY MRS. ELIZABETH J. EAMES.

———

TO ARABELLA, SLEEPING.

———

BY R. T. CONRAD.

———

———

BY R. PENN SMITH.

———

Strolling through a cemetery, I beheld within one of the enclosures a widow who had buried her only child there, some two years before. I accosted her, and tendered my assistance. “Thank you,” she replied, “my task is done. I have been pulling up the nettles and thistles that have overgrown little Willie’s grave, and have planted mnemonies, heart’s ease, and early spring flowers in their place, as more fitting emblems of my child; and though they may fail to delight him, they will remind me that there is a spring time even in the grave, and that Willie will not be neglected by Him who bids these simple flowers revive. But is it not strange how rank nettles and all offensive weeds grow over the human grave—even a child’s grave?”

“I remember you mourned grievously at losing him, but trust time has assuaged affliction.”

“Its poignancy is blunted, but memory is constantly hovering around my child. Duty and reason have taught me resignation; still I seldom behold a boy of his age, but fancy pictures to me how he would have appeared in the various stages of his progress toward manhood. And then again I see him like his father—and myself a proud and happy mother in old age. True, you may call it an idle, baseless dream; and so it is, but I cannot help indulging in it.”

“Dream on! the best of life is a dream.”

We walked a few steps, and paused before an inclosure where reposed the remains of a worthy man, with nothing more than his unobtrusive name inscribed upon a marble slab to designate his resting-place. He was respected for his integrity and energy; beloved for his utility and benevolence. Here was no lying inscription, making the grave gorgeous, as if monumental mendacity might deceive Divinity. His record was elsewhere, traced by unseen fingers.

“There are no nettles on that good man’s grave,” said the widow. “I knew him well; weeds would wither there; nothing but flowers should cover his ashes.”

A few young men at the time were idly passing. They paused, when one tearing a weed from the pathway, hurled it among the flowers, exclaiming, “Let him rot there with weeds for his covering.” The slumbering dust thus spurned had long sustained the ingrate who now voided his venom upon the benefactor who had fed him until there was no longer faith in hope. The widow sighed; “And this is on the grave of the good and just!”

“Had Willie lived, he might have been such a man, and such would have been his harvest.”

In the next tomb a brave soldier mingled his ashes with the red earth of Adam. In his early career he was placed in a position where daring energies alone could command success. He succeeded, and was rewarded by a nation’s approbation. No subsequent opportunity occurred to acquire peculiar distinction; and when he died, a shaft was erected commemorating the most remarkable action of his life. His tomb attracted the attention of some visiters who read his epitaph. “Characteristic of the age!” exclaimed one, throwing a pebble at the inscription, “to swell a corporal to the dimensions of a Cæsar. It was the only action of a protracted life, worthy of record, and here it is emblazoned for the pride of posterity.” Had the thoughtless scoffer of the unconscious dead occupied his position, which gained renown, history possibly might have perpetuated disgrace, instead of a tombstone record of gallant services—the patriot’s sole reward.

“You knew the soldier?”

“For years, and well. A brave and worthy man. The current of his useful life flowed smoothly on, without being ruffled by the breath of calumny.”

“And yet nettles cover his grave already!”

“Such might have been your child’s destiny—but that matters little; praise or scorn are now alike to the old soldier.”

We passed to a spot where a gay party was leaning on a railing. A young woman had plucked some of the gayest flowers from the enclosure, and was laughing with her merry companions. As we approached, she threw the bouquet already soiled and torn, on the grave; and they went their way with some idle jest upon their lips. The widow paused, and struggled to suppress her emotion.

“Did you know the tenant of this grave?”

“From his childhood. He loved that woman, and struggled to acquire wealth to make her happy. He succeeded, and when she discovered that he was completely within her toils, she deceived and left him hopeless. There are men whose hearts retain the simplicity of childhood through life; and such was his. Without reproaching her, or breathing her name to any one, he suddenly shrunk as a blighted plant, and withered day by day, until he died. Like the fabled statuary, he was enamored of the creature his own mind had fashioned, and in the credulity of his nature, he made her wealthy, trusting that time would infuse truth and vitality into the unreal vision of his youthful imagination. The world of love is a paradise of shadows! The man beside her is now her husband; the wealth they revel in, this grave bequeathed them.”

“The fool! to die heart-broken—for a dream. But great men have at times died broken-hearted. I should not call him fool. It is a common death among good men.”

“Great men! But women, sir, have pined away to death.”

“In poetry, the bill of mortality is a long one; in real life the patients seldom die, unless they chance to be both vain and poor. Did a rich widow ever grieve to death for the loss of the noblest husband? Wealth is a potent antidote to the malady, and teaches resignation; while poverty, with the first blow of his iron sledge, will make his cold anvil smoke with the heart’s blood, for he is buried who for years had withstood the blow.”

“That woman did not cast nettles on his grave.”

“No nettles, but faded roses which she tore from it—blooming when she came there. Better cast stones and nettles than those withered flowers. Your boy has escaped this poor man’s destiny—the worst of deaths! His was the happiest! he died—smiling—on his fond mother’s bosom! But there is a grave around which weeds grow more luxuriantly, than about the sepulchre where mortal dust reposes. Daily watchfulness is required to prevent the bright creations therein buried, from being so over-run until nothing is seen to designate the beautiful tomb, where we had carefully embalmed them, as if in amber.”

“What grave, sir, do you refer to?”

“The human mind. A mighty grave wherein we daily bury crushed hopes and brilliant ephemerons, too fragile to survive the chill atmosphere of a solitary day. Keep the weeds from growing there and smothering their memories. They are the progeny of the soul, and should not be allowed to perish. Shall the joyous and beautiful creations of childhood be forgotten in age; must the noble aspirations of the vigor of manhood pass away without even an epitaph, because crushed in their vigor! Rather contemplate them hourly; plant flowers beside them, though they bloom but briefly and fade, they will send forth perfume even in decay, and inevitably revive in due season, bearing refreshing fruit; and old age, with palsied hand, will readily gather up the long account of his stewardship, and as he glances over the lengthened scroll that must become a record in the archives of eternity, may rejoice that he hath not been an ingrate and idler in the heat of the harvest-field, but hath diligently labored to make the entrusted talent yield the expected usage. Tear up the weeds that are incessantly growing there, ere he who was placed little lower than the angels, becomes an empty cenotaph—a stranger’s grave—mouldering and mingling with his mother earth unheeded and unknown.”

———

BY A STUDENT.

———

Many of our readers have undoubtedly been asked during the past month for information touching the whereabouts of some trite quotation, the locality of which the whole neighborhood has not been able accurately to decide. We have often thought it would be a commendable service if some industrious student would make a complete collection of the every day sayings, and print them side by side with the author’s names. As no one, however, has seen fit to pioneer in the attempt, we here make a beginning, confident that the plan is worthy to be carried out more fully. At some future period, if no one else seems willing to continue the undertaking, we hope to find leisure and opportunity for other specimens in “Graham.” Meantime, here are a few of the more common lines in “everybody’s mouth.”

It stands thus in the original:

FROM LIFE STUDIES.

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BY ENNA DUVAL.

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1.—“CHILD’S PLAY.”

It was a beautiful summer afternoon. The high trees cast long shadows on the grass, and the glorious golden sunlight beamed richly over the landscape. In a thickly wooded park, whose long, winding walks were bordered by the rhododendron, and overshadowed by forest-trees, were several young girls. They were simply dressed, and quite young, at the season of early girlhood—thirteen, fourteen, and fifteen might have been their ages—certainly not older. They were all graceful, delicate little creatures—American girls and women almost always are, as foreigners have remarked. Two or three only, however, were decidedly pretty.

“I am tired of walking,” said one; “let’s stop here a little while, and play something.”

The girl had well chosen the spot, for it was beautiful enough to have tempted the faërys—if any there be—to make of it, a play-ground. The wood skirted a stream, rising from its shores in little undulating hills, and the owner had availed himself of this, in arranging the walks in his wood, so that by slightly assisting Nature, these walks seemed terraced. The place selected, was where one of the walks widened a little—the hilly terrace rose gently behind it, forming a turfy bank that served for seats, and forest-trees crested the little summit of this hill. Beneath the walk, the ground-swell shaded by trees, sloped down to the stream-side, and between the foliage could be seen the glittering wavelets, dancing along in the golden atmosphere shed around them by the glorious setting sun.

Had these little rambling girls been a shadow older, or breathing a more poetic imaginative atmosphere than their sunny American home, they might have sat and dreamed romances, out of “old Poesy’s Myths,” and fancied that,

But no! the influences of their associations in their home-lives, rendered their imaginations—for imaginations they had—less dreamy, less poetical.

This work-day atmosphere in which we striving, success-seeking Americans live and breathe, deprives even our childhood’s day-dreams of romance and poësy, and who can say whether it be well or not? The mysterious voice of the Past says, “All that is permitted is needed,” therefore, let this American Judaic spirit roll on, the Nineteenth Century needs it, to perform her part of the world’s development.

If we return to our little wood-ramblers and listen to their gossip, we shall see how tangible and real were the subjects of their day-dreams, though quite as improbable, apparently, as the old imaginings of Enchantment and Faëry Land.

“Oh,” lisped a little coquettish thing, the pet evidently of the group, whose light, floating ringlets threw faint shadows over her round, white shoulders, “let’s play that I’m a duchess, and you are all come to visit me at my ducal palace. These are my grounds, and some of you shall be my ladies.” Thereupon the little witch threw her faëry form on the turfy bank, in a languishing position, and prepared to take upon her little self, all the state and dignity of a duchess.

“Not I for one,” said the tallest of the group, although the rest seemed half disposed to enter into the proposed play. “If there’s to be any duchess playing, I’ll be the titled lady. Yes, I will be your princess, and hold here my regal court.”

If princesses have a divine right to beauty, the girl might have been one of the most royal. She had, for so young a girl, a presence and bearing remarkable for dignity, and her form gave promise of fine development. Her head was well placed on a beautiful neck and drooping shoulders. Her rich, dark hair was cut short and brushed back from a low Medicean brow, and it clustered in thick, close curls around the back of her well-shaped head and white neck. Although her brow was low, and her chin almost voluptuously full, her keen, black eyes, arched eye-brows, that in some moods almost met over a nose that was delicate and handsome in shape, and whose nostrils trembled and dilated with every shadow of feeling, and a mouth well shaped, but firm in expression, all told that the girl had a haughty, imperious spirit, one such as a princess might have; and she carried herself as though she would have said, as Marie Antoinette did, when some one remarked her erect bearing,

“Were I not a queen, I suppose, people would call me insolent.”

“Duchess and princess indeed!” exclaimed one of the girls, contemptuously. “How absurd to talk such nonsense. Who ever heard of such duchesses and princesses as you’d make?”

“And why not, mademoiselle?” asked the would-be princess.

“Now Caro is grand,” laughed one of the girls; “don’t you take notice, girls, she always calls us mademoiselles, when she wants to take state?”

But the girl repeated her question, haughtily, without heeding the saucy interruption. Her manner seemed to intimidate the other, and pleased with her apparent victory, she continued, drawing herself up to her full height, and looking even more stately.

“Yes, I will be a princess. Why should I not be? My grandmother was a queen, and my great uncle an emperor. I will give you all grand titles, too. You, Lina, I will make a countess, for you are too little and delicate, pet-bird, to be a duchess—that sounds too matronly for you; but as for you, Mademoiselle Helen, you shall only be a simple maid of honor, and may be, lady of the bed-chamber after awhile, if you stop sneering at my rank.”

“Oh Caro and Lina,” said Helen, impatiently, “don’t be so silly; it is ridiculous. You are always spoiling our walks with these foolish make-believes.”

“What do you mean, Mademoiselle Helen?” asked Caro, with flashing eyes, and nostrils dilating with unrepressed indignation.

“I mean just what I say, Caro; that you always make yourself absurd and disagreeable by wanting us to play such vain, silly plays; and you do Lina no good either, for her little head is filled now with nothing else but nonsensical notions that will give her a great deal of trouble. I am a year or two older than you, Miss, and can see the folly of all this; but even if I were not, I hope I should not be such a silly little fool as to try to imagine I was something grander than I was not, and what is more, never will be.”

Caro’s face grew crimson, and she bit her full, red lip until the rich blood nearly started from it while she listened to this irritating speech. When it was concluded, she threw up her head and exclaimed in a voice choked with passion,

“This comes of associating with plebians.”

“Plebians, indeed!” said Helen, indignantly.

“Yes, plebians, mademoiselle,” answered Caro, looking steadily and haughtily at her. “You are a plebian when compared with me, for my grandmother was a crowned queen, and my uncle the great Emperor Napoleon; am I not, then, a princess of most regal descent? And you, Lina, darling,” she continued, putting her arm patronizingly around the little creature, “I only hope I may be as my grandmother was, a throned queen, then I would do more than put grand notions in your head. I would put great titles to your name, and brave retinues to back them.”

“Madame, your mother, most royal princess,” said the annoying Helen, with provoking coolness, “has the misfortune, however, at present, to be the instructress of the daughter of a plebian country lawyer.”

“It is a misfortune, mademoiselle,” answered Caro.

The girls drew together a little frightened; they knew a crisis was coming, for many times before had they witnessed similar “passages at arms,” between the two girls, but never such a threatening one.

“Never mind Caro,” said little Lina, “let’s leave Helen; she’s always so cross, and says such ill-bred things. We’ll go and play by ourselves. You shall be our queen, and I will be your little countess, or any thing you want me to be. The girls will go with us, too; wont you, girls?”

“Ha! ha!” laughed the now irritated Helen, for she saw that most of the girls were disposed to take Caro’s part. “This is amusing, truly, to see the daughter of a plain American country store-keeper playing countess, and the granddaughter of a French inn-keeper taking state and royal airs over simple republicans.”

Helen’s tantalizing expressions might have caused one thing royal—a “battle royal”—for, although they were little young ladies, they were sometimes apt to forget the rules of good breeding daily enjoined upon them—but fortunately they were interrupted. Some ladies joined them—mothers and elder sisters of the girls; for this park-like wood was a favorite afternoon resort for the inhabitants of the little village of B——. The angry retort trembled on Caro’s tongue, and frowning glances were exchanged between them; for awhile their quarrel was suspended—but only for awhile; the next day would be sure to renew the scene. After a little talk with the ladies, Caro and Lina withdrew to another part of the grounds, followed by their adherents, which we must confess, comprised the greater number of the school; and the sturdy little republican, Helen, was in the minority, for only two or three of the older girls espoused her cause. As they left, one of the remaining girls whispered to Helen, with a merry laugh,

“See, Caro and Lina are going off to hold their Court. Had we not better set up a rival one? We will elect you lady president, or cabinet officer’s lady, or senator’s wife. You would not, I suppose, take any less republican title from us, and, of course, it would be hardly safe or proper to send you ministress plenipotentiary to adjust difficulties between the two governments.”

Helen laughed contemptuously, as if she thought the whole affair too childish to be noticed. But her little heart was not much, if any, better than Caro’s and Lina’s. Like theirs it swelled with anger and pride, and although she was a good, sensible girl, she many times permitted her temper and a spirit of envious rivalry that had unconsciously sprung up between her and Caro, to master her, and make her forget the gentle courtesy and good-breeding which should characterize every woman, whether republican or aristocrat—because she is a woman.

——

2.—“FORTUNE’S PRANKS.”

Carriages rolled through the crowded streets of Paris, and a gay crowd thronged to the residence of the republican prince—the new French president. A stately levee was to be held, and Josephine’s grandson inherited Napoleon’s popularity! Time had avenged her wrongs, and Fortune, which had played such curious, elfish pranks with this great family, had set them once more aloft, but at their head she placed with strange justice the representative of the dethroned, divorced empress.

It was a brilliant sight. Ladies were there in gorgeous costume, glittering with diamonds, and gentlemen in full court-dress decked with orders. Near the President stood a group of beautiful women—the women of his family—his cousins, once, twice, and thrice removed. Among them was a lady who attracted the admiring gaze of more than one passer-by. She had a majestic presence, though still quite young—in the first flush of early womanhood. Her face was as beautiful as her form, which was faultless in its proportions. She had a clear, rich skin—eyes by turns flashing and serene, under “level fronting eye-lids”—a beautiful mouth, with the full lips gently and sweetly parted, and a Napoleonesque chin, that told her Buonaparte descent, with a lovely dimple denting its centre. Her thick, glossy hair was dressed with classical severity, for they told her, her head was like the Princess Pauline’s, and made her bind it with a broad coronet, woven of her own rich hair. She was beautiful enough to have inspired another Canova to sculpture her also as a Venus.

A buzz was heard, while the Russian Ambassador presented a gentleman and lady with much consideration to the president. The young cousin of the president started, and a brilliant flush crimsoned her cheek—whose only fault, if fault it could be, was its delicate pallor—as she looked at the lady newly presented, and heard her title—the Countess O——.

The countess was a fair young creature with a delicate sylph-like figure, and her hair fell in soft, brown ringlets, as if wishing to burst from the confinement of the jeweled comb and costly bandeau, in order to shade her timid beauty. Many remarked the purity and simplicity of her style, and low murmurs told the inquiring stranger, that though bearing a foreign name and title, she was said to be an American.

The crowd increased, and the circle around the president gradually separated, making room for the throng of nobodys who wished to be presented. The hum of conversation grew louder, and though the new president exacted much ceremony, it was plain to be seen that etiquette did not forbid the merry laugh, nor the sparkling repartée.

A little group of ladies and gentlemen stood near a window, laughing and chatting with all that sprightliness with which the French people of society know so well how to enliven conversation. Some of the company passed by, promenading. A lady of the group at the window, lifted her arm—it must have been unconsciously, certainly it was done gracefully, and in so doing, entangled her magnificent diamond bracelet in the costly lace berthé of a lady passing by.

The owner of the offending bracelet was the cousin of the President, the lady of the berthé the fair Russian countess. The first bent over as if to disentangle the sparkling clasp from the delicate meshes of the lace, and her manner, repulsed all offers of assistance from those standing by. It seemed a difficult task, however, and she had quite time enough to say more than the mere apologies required, and surely she did say more than those standing near them heard, for the mere “Pardonnez moi Madame je vous prie,” could not have caused the slight start which the pretty little countess gave, nor the delicate flush that tinged her fair temples, when the French lady’s glowing cheek rested near hers, in bending down to disentangle her ornament.

“Lina,” said the president’s cousin, in a low, laughing tone, that gurgled up like the melody of foam-bells in a stream, “who would have thought when Helen Morris used to laugh at us in America, that our childish imaginings would come true? Why, darling, you are not only a countess, but you are wedded to the first and oldest blood of Europe; and I, dear one—yes, I—if not an acknowledged princess, will yet be a queen.”

The bracelet was disengaged—the berthé released. The French lady made a low courtesy to the countess, with her eyes bent upon the ground—and they parted.

Fortune is a capricious goddess, and surely the wildest, most improbable romances ever imagined, could not surpass, scarcely equal, the strange reverses the blind goddess of the wheel has brought to the family of the great “World-Actor of the Nineteenth Century,” Napoleon.

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BY HENRY WILLIAM HERBERT, AUTHOR OF FRANK FORESTER’S “FIELD SPORTS,” “FISH AND FISHING,” ETC.

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THE AMERICAN QUAIL, OR VIRGINIA PARTRIDGE.
(Ortyx Virginianus. Perdix Virginianus.)

November is upon us—hearty, brown, healthful November, harbinger of his best joys to the ardent sportsman, and best beloved to him of all the months of the great annual cycle; November, with its clear, bracing, western breezes; its sun, less burning, but how far more beautiful than that of fierce July, as tempered now and softened by the rich, golden haze of Indian summer, quenching his torrent rays in its mellow, liquid lustre, and robing the distant hills with wreaths of purple light, half mist, half shrouded sunshine; November, with its wheat and buckwheat stubbles, golden or bloody red; with its sere maize leaves rustling in the breeze, whence the quail pipes incessant; with its gay woodlands flaunting in their many-colored garb of glory; with its waters more clearly calm, more brilliantly transparent than those of any other season; November, when the farmer’s toils have rendered their reward, and his reaped harvests glut his teeming garners, so that he too, like the pent denizen of swarming cities, may take his leisure with his gun “in the wide vale, or by the deep wood-side,” and enjoy the rapture of those sylvan sports which he may not participate in sweltering July, in which they are, alas! permitted by ill-considered legislation, in every other state, save thine, honest and honorable Massachusetts.^[2]

In truth there is no period of the whole year so well adapted, both by the seasonable climate, and the state of the country, shorn of its crops, and not now to be injured by the sportsman’s steady stride, or the gallop of his high-bred setters, both by the abundance of game in the cleared stubbles and the sere woodlands, and by the aptitude of the brisk, bracing weather for the endurance of fatigue, and the enjoyment of manful exercise, as this our favorite November.

In this month, the beautiful Ruffed Grouse, that mountain-loving, and man-shunning hermit, steals down from his wild haunts among the giant rhododendrons, and evergreen rock-calmias, to nearer woodskirts, and cedar-brakes margining the red buckwheat stubbles, to be found there by the staunch dogs, and brought to bag by the quick death-shot, “at morn and dewy eve,” without the toil and torture, often most vain and vapid, of scaling miles on miles of mountain-ledges, struggling through thickets of impenetrable verdure among the close-set stems of hemlock, pine, or juniper, only to hear the startled rush of an unseen pinion, and to pause, breathless, panting, and outdone, to curse, while you gather breath for a renewed effort, the bird which haunts such covert, and the covert which gives shelter to such birds.

In this month, if no untimely frost, or envious snow flurry come, premature, to chase him to the sunny swamps of Carolina and the rice-fields of Georgia, the plump, white-fronted, pink-legged autumn Woodcock, flaps up from the alder-brake with his shrill whistle, and soars away, away, on a swift and powerful wing above the russet tree-tops, to be arrested only by the instinctive eye and rapid finger of the genuine sportsman; and no longer as in faint July to be bullied and bungled to death by every German city pot-hunter, or every pottering rustic school-boy, equipped and primed for murder, on his Saturday’s half holyday.

In this month, the brown-jacketed American hare, which our folk will persist in calling Rabbit—though it neither lives in warrens, nor burrows habitually under ground, and though it breeds not every month in the year, which are the true distinctive characteristics of the Rabbit—is in his prime of conditions, the leverets of the season, plump and well grown; and the old bucks and does, recruited after the breeding season, in high health and strength, and now legitimate food for gunpowder, legitimate quarry for the chase of the merry beagles.

In this month especially, the Quail, the best-loved and choicest object of the true sportsman’s ambition; the bird which alone affords more brilliant and exciting sport than all the rest beside; the bravest on the wing, and the best on the board; the swiftest and strongest flyer of any feathered game; the most baffling to find, the most troublesome to follow up, and when followed up and found, the most difficult to kill in style; the beautiful American Quail is in his highest force and feather; and in this month, according to the laws of all the States, even the most rigorous and stringent in preservation, killable legitimately under statute.

In New York, generally, the close-time for the Quail ends with October, and he may not be slain until the first day of November; in New Jersey, ortygicide commences on the 25th of October, in Massachusetts and Connecticut on some day between the 15th of the past and the first of the present month; in Pennsylvania, Delaware and Maryland, where they are something more forward, as breeding earlier in the season than in the Eastern States, on the first of October; and in Canada West, where they are exceedingly abundant, on the first of September; which is, for many reasons, entirely too early, as hereafter I shall endeavor to demonstrate.

In my own opinion, the first of November, and even the middle of October, are too late for the termination of the Quail’s close-time, inasmuch as five-sevenths of the broods in ordinarily forward seasons are full-grown and strong on the wing, as well as all the crops off the ground, by the first of October; and although the late, second, or third broods may be undersized, they are still well able to take care of themselves in case the parent birds are killed; whereas, on account of their immature size, they are safe from the legitimate shot; and, on account of their unsaleability in market to the restaurant, from the poaching pot-shot also.

I should, therefore, myself, be strongly inclined to advocate the adoption of one common day, and that day the first of October, for the close-time of all our upland game; the English Snipe alone excepted. Touching the reasons for postponing the day of Woodcock-shooting, a notice will be found in our July number, and an extended discussion in my Field Sports, vol. I. pp. 169 to 200. Of the Quail, in regard to this point, I have said enough here, unless this; that, in my opinion, there is far more need to protect them from the trap during the wintry snows, than from the gun in the early autumn; the latter cannot possibly at any time exterminate the race; the former not only easily may, but actually does all but annihilate the breed, whenever the snow falls and lies deep during any weeks of December, during the whole of which month the pursuit and sale of this charming little bird is legal.

Could I have my way, the close-time for Quail should end on the last day of September; and the shooting season end on the twenty-fourth day of December; before which date snow now rarely lies continuously in New Jersey, Southern New York, or Pennsylvania. Why I would anticipate the termination of the close-time, in reference to the Ruffed Grouse, I shall state at length, when I come to treat of that noble bird, in our December issue; to which month I have attributed it, because it is then that it is, though in my opinion, it ought not to be, most frequently seen on our tables. While on the topic of preservation, I will mention a fact, which certainly is not widely, much less generally known, among farmers; namely, that this merry and domestic little bird is one of his best friends and assistants in the cultivation of his lands. During nine or ten months of the year he subsists entirely on the seeds of many of the most troublesome and noxious weeds and grasses, which infest the fields, more especially those of the ragwort, the dock, and the briar. It is believed, I might almost say ascertained, that he never plucks any kind of grain, even his own loved buckwheat when ripe, from the stalk, but only gleans the fallen seeds from the stubbles after harvest, so that while he in nothing deteriorates the harvest to be ingathered, he tends in the highest degree to the preservation of clean and unweeded fields and farms; indeed, when it is taken into consideration that each individual Quail consumes daily nearly two gills of weed-seed, it will be at once evident that a few bevies of these little birds, carefully and assiduously preserved on a farm, will do more toward keeping it free of weeds, than the daily annual labor of a dozen farm-servants. This preservation will not be counteracted or injured by a moderate and judicious use of the gun in the autumnal months; for the bevies need thinning, especially of the cock-birds, which invariably outnumber the hens, and which, if unable to pair, from a want of mates, form into little squads or companies of males, which remain barren, and become the deadly enemies of the young cocks of the following year, beating them off and dispersing them; though, strange to say, they will themselves never mate again, nor do aught, after remaining unpaired during one season, to propagate their species. The use of the trap, on the contrary, destroying whole bevies at a swoop, where the gun, even in the most skillful hands, rarely much more than decimates them, may, in a single winter’s day, if many traps be set, destroy the whole stocking of a large farm for years, if not forever. I have myself invariably remarked, since my attention was first called to the fact, that those farms which are best stocked with Quail, are invariably the cleanest of weeds; and a right good sportsman, and good friend of mine, working on the same base per contra, says that, in driving his shooting-cart and dogs through a country, he has never found it worth his while to stop and beat a district full of weedy and dirty farms, as such never contain Quail.

If this may lead our farmers to consider that every live Quail does far more good on the farm, than the shilling earned by his capture in the omnivorous trap; and therefore to prohibit their sons and farm-boys from exterminating them at their utmost need, when food is scarce, and shelter hard to find, my words will not have been altogether wasted, nor my object unattained.

Were I a farmer, I would hang it over my kitchen fireplace, inscribed in goodly capitals—“Spare the Quail! If you would have clean fields and goodly crops, spare the Quail! So shall you spare your labor.”

And now, in a few words, we will on to their nomenclature, their distinctive marks, their regions of inhabitation, seasons, haunts, and habits; and last, not least, how, when, and where lawfully, honorably, sportsmanly, and gnostically, you may and shall, kill them.

I will not, however, here pause long to discuss the point, whether they ought to be termed Quail or Partridge. Scientifically and practically they are neither, but a connecting link between the two subgenera. True Partridge, nor true Quail, very perdix, nor very coturnix, exists at all anywhere in America. Our bird, an intermediate bird between the two, named by the naturalists Ortyx, which is the Greek term for true Quail, is peculiar to America, of which but one species, that before us, is found in the United States, except on the Pacific coast and in California, where there are many other beautiful varieties. Our bird is known everywhere East, and everywhere North-west of Pennsylvania, and in Canada, as the Quail—everywhere South as the Partridge. In size, plumage, flight, habits, and cry, it more closely resembles the European Quail; in some structural points, especially the shape and solidity of the bill, the European Partridge. On the whole, I deem it properly termed American Quail; but whether of the two it shall be called, matters little, as no other bird on this continent can clash with it, so long as we avoid the ridicule of calling one bird by two different terms, on the opposite sides of one river—the Delaware. The stupid blunder of calling the Ruffed Grouse, Pheasant, and Partridge, in the South and East, is a totally different kind of misnomer; as that bird bears no resemblance, however distant, to either of the two species, and has a very good English name of his own, videlicet, “Ruffed or Tippeted Grouse,” by which alone he is known to men of brains or of sportsmanship. With regard to our Quail, it is different, as he has no distinctive English name of his own; but is, even by naturalists, indiscriminately known as Quail and Partridge. The former is certainly the truer appellation, as he approximates more closely to that sub-genus. We wish much that this question could be settled; which we fear, now, that it never can be, from the want of any sporting authority, in the country, to pass judgment. The “Spirit of the Times,” though still as well supported and as racy as ever, has, I regret to say, ceased to be an authority, and has become a mere arena wherein for every scribbler to discuss and support his own undigested and crude notions without consideration or examination; and wherein those who know the least, invariably fancying themselves to know the most, vituperate with all the spite of partisan personality, every person who having learned more by reading, examination of authorities, and experience than they, ventures to express an opinion differing from their old-time prejudices, and the established misnomers of provincial or sectional vulgarism.

But to resume, the American Quail, or “Partridge of the South,” is too well known throughout the whole of America, from the waters of the Kennebec on the East, and the Great Lakes on the North—beyond which latter, except on the South-western peninsula of Canada West, lying between Lakes Erie, St. Clair, and Huron, they are scarcely to be found—is too well known, almost to the extreme South, to need description. Their beauty, their familiar cry, their domestic habits during the winter, when they become half civilized, feeding in the barn-yards, and often roosting under the cattle-sheds with the poultry, render them familiar to all men, women, boys and fools throughout the regions, which they inhabit. It is stated by ornithologists, that they abound from Nova Scotia and the northern parts of Canada to Florida and the Great Osage villages; but this is incorrect, as they rarely are seen eastward of Massachusetts; never in Nova Scotia, or Canada East; and range so far as Texas, and the edges of the great American salt desert. The adult male bird differs from the hen in having its chaps and a remarkable gorget on the throat and lower neck, pure white, bordered with jetty black; which parts, in the young male and the adult female, are bright reddish-yellow; the upper parts of both are beautifully dashed and freckled with chestnut and mahogany-brown, black, yellow, gray, and pure white; the under parts pure white, longitudinally dashed with brownish red, and transversely streaked with black arrow-headed marks. The colors of the male are all brighter, and more definite, than in the female.

Everywhere eastward of the Delaware the Quail is resident, never rambling far from the haunts in which he is bred. Everywhere to the westward he is in the later autumn migratory, moving constantly on foot, and never flying except when flushed or compelled to cross streams and water-courses, from the west eastward; the farther west, the more marked is this peculiarity.

The Quail pairs early in March; begins to lay early in May, in a nest made on the surface of the ground, usually at the bottom of a tussock or tuft of grass, her eggs being pure white, and from ten to thirty-two in number, though about fourteen is probably the average of the bevies. The period of incubation is about four weeks, the young birds run the instant they clip the shell, and fly readily before they have been hatched a fortnight. So soon as the first brood is well on the wing, the cock takes charge of it, and the hen proceeds to lay and hatch a second, the male bird and first brood remaining in the close vicinity, and the parents, I doubt not, attending the labor of incubation and attending the young. This I have long suspected; but I saw so many proofs of it, in company of my friend and fellow sportsman, “Dinks,” while shooting together near Fort Malden, in Canada West—where we found, in many instances, two distinct bevies of different sizes with a single pair of old birds, when shooting early in September of last year—that we were equally convinced of the truth of the fact, and of the unfitness of the season.

In October, with the exception of a very few late broods, they are fit for the gun; and then, while the stubbles are long, and the weeds and grasses rank, they lie the best and are the least wild on the wing. The early mornings and late afternoons are the fittest times for finding them, when they are on the run, and feeding in the edges of wheat and rye stubbles, or buckwheat patches bordering on woodlands. In the middle of the day they either lie up in little brakes and bog-meadows, or bask on sandy banks, and craggy hill-sides, when they are collected into little huddles, and are then difficult to find. As soon as flushed, they pitch into the thickest neighboring covert, whether bog-meadow, briar-patch, cedar-brake, ravine, or rough corn-stubble, they can find, their flight being wild, rapid, and impetuous, but rarely very long, or well sustained. As they unquestionably possess the mysterious power, whether voluntary or involuntary, of holding in their scent, for a short time after alighting, and are difficultly found again till they have run, I recommend it, as by far the better way, to mark them down well, and beat for another bevy, until you hear them calling to each other; then lose no time in flushing them again, when they are sure to disperse, and you to have sport with them.

Myself, I prefer setters for their pursuit, as more dashing, more enduring, and abler to face briars—others prefer pointers, as steadier on less work, and better able to fag without water. Either, well broke, are good—ill broke, or unbroke, worthless. Still give me setters—Russian or Irish specially! Quail fly very fast, and strong, especially in covert, and require the whole charge to kill them dead and clean. At cross shots, shoot well ahead; at rising shots, well above; and at straight-away shots, a trifle below your birds; and an oz. ¼ of No. 8, early, and of No. 7, late, will fetch them in good style. And so good sport to you, kind reader; for this, if I err not, is doomed to be a crack Quail season.

A LAY OF THE OLDEN TIME.

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BY FANNY FIELDING.

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BY GRACE GREENWOOD.

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BY WM. ALEXANDER.

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It was known as long ago as 1814, that Wordsworth had written the present poem, and that it would not be published until after his death. It now appears that it was commenced as far back as 1799, and was finally completed in 1805. The purpose of the poem is to exhibit the gradual growth of the poet’s mind, from its first development of imagination and passion, to the period when he conceived he had grown up to that height of contemplation which would justify his attempt to realize the great object of his life—the production of a philosophic poem on Man, Nature, and Society. “The Prelude,” is addressed to Coleridge, the poet’s intimate friend; and the egotism of the narrative is much modified, by its being thus seemingly intended, not for the public, but for the poet-metaphysician into whose single heart and brain its revelations are poured. The character of the poem is essentially psychological, the object being to notice only those events and scenes which fed and directed the poet’s mind, and to regard them, not so much in their own nature, as in their influence on the nature of the poet. The topics, therefore, though trite in themselves, are all made original from the peculiarities of the person conceiving them. His childhood and school-time, his residence at the university, his summer vacation, his visit to the Alps, his tour through France, his residence in London and France, are the principal topics; but the enumeration of the topics can convey no impression of the thought, observation, and imagination, the eloquent philosophy, vivid imagery, and unmistakable Wordsworthianism, which characterize the volume.

It must be admitted, however, that “The Prelude,” with all its merits, does not add to the author’s great fame, however much it may add to our knowledge of his inner life. As a poem it cannot be placed by the side of The White Doe, or The Excursion, or the Ode on Childhood, or the Ode on the Power of Sound; and the reason is to be found in its strictly didactic and personal character, necessitating a more constant use of analysis and reflection, and a greater substitution of the metaphysical for the poetic process, than poetry is willing to admit. Though intended as an introduction to “The Excursion,” it has not its sustained richness of diction and imagery; and there is little of that easy yielding of the mind to the inspiration of objects, and that ecstatic utterance of the emotions they excite, which characterize passages selected at random from the latter poem—as in that grand rushing forth of poetic impulse, in the Fourth Book:

“The Prelude” has many fine descriptions of nature, but nothing which rises to the beauty and sublimity of the following passage from “The Excursion”:

Not only do we see the superiority of “The Excursion” in such passages as these, but the didactic thought is more assured, is more colored by imagination, and melts more readily into soft, sweet, melodious expression. Take the following, for instance:

If “The Prelude” has thus fewer “trances of thought and mountings of the mind” than “The Excursion,” it still bears the marks of the lofty and thoughtful genius of the author, and increases our respect for his personal character. The books devoted to his residence in Cambridge, his tour to the Alps, and to the influence of the French Revolution upon his genius and character, are additions to the philosophy of the human mind. We believe that few metaphysicians ever scanned their consciousness with more intensity of vision, than Wordsworth was wont to direct upon his; and in the present poem he has subtily noted, and firmly expressed, many new psychological laws and processes. The whole subject of the development of the mind’s creative faculties, and the vital laws of mental growth and production, has been but little touched by professed metaphysicians; and we believe “The Prelude” conveys more real available knowledge of the facts and laws of man’s internal constitution, than can be found in Hume or Kant.

We have not space for many extracts from the poem. Its philosophical value could not be indicated by quotations, and we shall content ourselves with citing a few random passages, illustrative of its general style and thought. The following lines exhibit the tendency of Wordsworth’s mind, when a youth at college:

In the following stern description, he records his condemnation of life as he found it at the great English university of Cambridge:

The most remarkable line in the poem, a line almost equal to Milton’s “Thoughts that wander through eternity,” is that which concludes the following passage on the statue of Newton at Cambridge:

With the lingering, mysterious music of this line sounding in our ears, it would be an impertinence to continue these loose remarks on “The Prelude” any further; and we close by commending the poem to the thoughtful attention of thinking readers.

The author of this beautiful volume is a born orator, whose written style instinctively takes the form of eloquence, and whose strong and deep emotions are at once the inspirers and guides of his pen. He has given us here a dozen discourses, full of living thoughts and winged words, and with not a page which is open to the charge of dullness or triteness. When his theme compels him to introduce common thoughts he avoids commonplaces, and we cannot recognize the old acquaintance of our brain in the fresh and sparkling expression in which it here appears. Mr. Giles, indeed, is so thoroughly a thinker, and his mind is so pervaded by his sentiments, that where he lacks novelty he never lacks originality, and always gives indications of having conceived every thought he expresses. Nobody can read the present volume without being kindled by the vivid vitality with which it presents old truths, and the superb boldness with which it announces new ones. Among the many eloquent and impassioned discourses in the volume, that entitled “The Guilt of Contempt” is perhaps the sharpest in mental analysis, and closest and most condensed in style. It will rank with the best sermons ever delivered from an American pulpit. Another excellent and striking discourse is on the subject of spiritual incongruities as illustrated in the life of David. The five discourses on the Worth, the Personality, the Continuity, the Struggle, the Discipline, of Life, are remarkable for their clear statement of Christian principles, and the knowledge they evince of the inward workings of thought and emotions. Prayer and Passion is a sermon which securely threads all the labyrinths of selfishness, and exposes its most cunning movements and disguises.

We will give a few sentences illustrative of Mr. Giles’ mode of treating religious subjects, and the peculiar union of thought and emotion in his common style of expression. Speaking of the Psalms of David, he says—“They alone contain a poetry that meets the spiritual nature in all its moods and in all its wants, which strengthens virtue with glorious exhortations, gives angelic eloquence to prayer, and almost rises to the seraph’s joy in praise. . . For assemblies or for solitude, for all that gladdens and all that grieves, for our heaviness and despair, for our remorse and our redemption, we find in these divine harmonies the loud or the low expression. Great has been their power in the world. They resounded amidst the courts of the tabernacle; they floated through the lofty and solemn spaces of the temple. They were sung with glory in the halls of Zion; they were sung with sorrow by the streams of Babel. And when Israel had passed away, the harp of David was still awakened in the church of Christ. In all the eras and ages of that church, from the hymn which first it whispered in an upper chamber, until its anthems filled the earth, the inspiration of the royal prophet has enraptured its devotions and ennobled its ritual. And thus it has been, not alone in the august cathedral or the rustic chapel. Chorused by the winds of heaven, they have swelled through God’s own temple of the sky and stars; they have rolled over the broad desert of Asia, in the matins and vespers of ten thousand hermits. They have rung through the deep valleys of the Alps, in the sobbing voices of the forlorn Waldenses; through the steeps and caves of Scottish highlands, in the rude chantings of the Scottish Covenanters; through the woods and wilds of primitive America, in the heroic hallelujahs of the early pilgrims.”

The author of these volumes has been long extensively known as one of the leading editors of the country; and his age and experience peculiarly qualify him to do justice to the subject he here undertakes to treat. His own recollections must extend back some sixty years; and during that period he has been constantly connected with newspapers, either as printer’s apprentice, journeyman, or editor. He knew intimately most of the editors and writers for the press, who took prominent parts in the political controversies at the formation of the government, and during the first twenty years of its administration, and he is thoroughly acquainted with all the New England newspapers which appeared before the Revolution and during its progress. The work, therefore, is a reflection of the spirit of old times, giving their very “form and pressure,” and exhibiting, sometimes in a ludicrous light, old political passions in all their original frenzy of thought and form of expression. The specimens given of newspaper literature, in verse and prose, are all interesting either for their folly or wisdom, and some of them are valuable as curiosities of rhetoric and logic. Not only is the work valuable to the antiquary, the historian, and the members of “the craft,” but it contains matter sufficiently piquant to stimulate and preserve the attention of the general reader.

The author of these volumes is a marked instance of that inherent strength of character which pursues knowledge under difficulties, and is victorious over all obstacles which obstruct the elevation of the friendless. Without having received even a school education, and passing the period that boys usually devote to Lindley Murray in a printing office, he is one of the most vigorous and polished writers in New England, and in thorough acquaintance with classical English literature has no superiors. Every thing he writes bears the signs, not merely of intellect and taste, but of forcible character; and we believe that a selection from his newspaper articles would make a volume, which for originality of thought, and raciness of expression, would be an addition to our literature.

Whittier’s popularity, great as it is, must be increased by these Songs of Labor. In them, the Ship-Builders, Shoemakers, Drovers, Fishermen, Huskers and Lumbermen, are gifted with vigorous and melodious utterance, in songs whose chime is the very echo of their occupations. The other poems of the collection are of a merit as various as their themes. The best is the poem entitled “Memories,” one of the most exquisitely tender, thoughtful and imaginative poems in our literature. “Pious IX.” and “Elliott,” are essentially battle-pieces, and the rhymes clash together like the crossing of swords. Fierce and hot as the invective of these poems is, we still think the business of wrath is much better done in “Ichabod,” in which rage and scorn take the form of a dirge, and smiting sarcasms are insinuated through the phrases of grief. Throughout the volume we are impressed with the great nature of the author, and the superiority of the man to any thing he has yet produced. He unites, in a singular degree, tenderness with strength, delicate fancy with blazing imagination, sensitive sentiment with sturdy character; and his most exhilarating and trumpet-voiced lyrics have the air of impromptus. In the following lines, for instance, from a poem in the present volume on “The Peace Convention at Brussels,” he extemporises as good heroic verse as Campbell’s:

To judge from the dedication, the authoress of this goodly duodecimo must be the daughter of Cooper, the novelist. She has much of her father’s remarkable descriptive power, but is happily deficient in that fretful discontent which disturbs the harmony of his later productions. The volume will be found a delightful companion both to the denizen of the city and country. The writer wins upon the reader’s sympathies with every page. Her intelligence is clear and quiet, enlarged by intimacy with nature and good books, and elevated by a beautiful and unobtrusive piety. We hope this will not be her last production.

This thin volume is devoted to a subject which, though its discussion involves a consideration of topics properly metaphysical, has more general interest than any other in the science of metaphysics, because its phenomena stimulate the curiosity of all who, like Richard the Third, are troubled with dreams. The author supports, with great power of illustration and argument, three propositions, viz., that during sleep the mental faculties are as active as during wakefulness; that memory is no criterion by which to judge the mind in sleep; and that the mind is dependent upon the integrity of the organs of external sensation for a remembrance of what transpires during this state. The discussion of these topics is enlivened by many curious examples.

This is a thick volume of some seven hundred pages, completely crammed with facts relating to the history, geography, and present condition of every state in Europe. The index, containing ten thousand names, will convey an idea of the amount of matter which the author has compressed into his volume. Though a work of vast labor, we presume that its value, as a work for constant reference, will amply repay the expense of compiling it. Every man who reads European news should possess the book, provided he desires to read news intelligently. It gives accurate ideas of the relative importance of the various States, by exhibiting their financial condition as well as their territory, population, and productions.

Every lover of the romantic and picturesque in history will heartily welcome this re-issue of Irving’s charming Chronicle. By assuming the position of a contemporary, he is enabled to exhibit the prejudices of the time with almost dramatic vividness, and to give events some of the coloring they derived from Spanish bigotry without obscuring their real nature and import. The beautiful mischievousness of the occasional irony which peeps through the narrative, is in the author’s happiest style. The book might easily be expanded into a dozen novels, so rich is it in materials of description and adventure. In its present form it is replete with accurate history, represented with pictorial vividness.

The theme which Mrs. Ellet has chosen is an important one, and absolutely necessary to be comprehended by all who wish to understand the American Revolution as a living fact. The great defect of most of our national histories and biographies is their abstract character, neither characters nor events being represented in the concrete, and brought directly home to the hearts and imaginations of readers. The result is, that most of us, when we attempt to be patriotic, slide so readily into bombast; for having no distinct conceptions of what was really done and suffered by our forefathers and foremothers, we can only glorify them by a resort to the dictionary. Mrs. Ellet’s book is devoted to those scenes and persons in our revolutionary history, in exhibiting which the novelist is commonly so far in advance of the historian; and she has performed her task with much discrimination in the selection of materials, and no little pictorial power in representing what she has selected.

This is Grace Aguilar’s last work, in the most melancholy sense of the word, she having died of consumption shortly after its completion. The story is one of much interest; the sentiments beautiful and pure; the style sweet and pleasing. We have read none of her novels with more satisfaction than this. At a period when romance writing has been so much perverted from its true purpose, it is delightful to find a novelist who, to a talent for narrative, united a regard for the highest and purest sentiments of human nature.

This novel, in title the same as one by Theodore S. Fay, is in matter and style very different. It is a historical novel of the period of the religious wars in Scotland, and though not peculiarly excellent in characters, is filled with stirring events and attractive scenes. The publishers, without much increasing the price, have printed it in a style of much neatness. Large type and white paper are a blessing not commonly vouchsafed to American novel readers.

“Margaret Percival,” by Miss Sewall, has had a large circulation in this country, and it is but right that the present novel, which not only represents Margaret as a more tolerant Christian, but describes the process by which she became so, should be read by all who have been influenced by the English Margaret.

This thick and handsome duodecimo contains many of the most charming and sprightly of Mr. Willis’s popular compositions, evincing that singular combination of sentiment and shrewdness, of poetic feeling and knowledge of the world, in which he has no American rival. The style, airy, graceful and fluent, is distinguished by a “polished want of polish,” a fertility of apt and fanciful expression, and a gliding ease of movement, which take the reader captive, and bear him on through “long reaches of delight.”

This novel has hardly the fresh, dashing, daring character of Dr. Mayo’s first romance, but it still has sufficient raciness and audacity to serve for a score of common novels. The author has great tact in so choosing his scenes and characters that the peculiar powers of his mind can have free play. In “The Berber” the incidents follow each other in such quick succession that we make no demands for originality or power of characterization. In respect to the latter, Dr. Mayo is so far deficient, though he gives evidence of being capable of drawing characters as well as telling a story.

The idea of this volume is capital. It consists of short and spicy selections from eminent authors, and anecdotes of distinguished men, of a character very different from those which form the staple of jest-books. The principal source whence the editor has derived his brilliancies, is that most gentlemanly of wits and humorists, Sydney Smith; and a fine portrait of him very properly adorns the title page. The book would have been even better than it is, if the author had drawn his matter from a wider circle of reading.

This novel has been absurdly puffed in England, but it is nevertheless an interesting and well written one, worthy the pen which wrote “The Crescent and the Cross.” The period in which its events and characters are laid, the Great Rebellion, so called, has not recently been treated, but it has great capabilities for romantic and humorous characterization, which Warburton has employed, not indeed with the sagacity and genius of Scott, but with much skill and with dramatic effect.

In some respects we prefer this memoir to that by Miss Strickland. The only fault we have to find with Miss Benger, indeed, is that she is too eulogistic. No one, in this age, doubts that Anne Boleyn was an innocent woman, who fell a victim partly to political intrigue, partly to her husband’s fickleness; but it is useless to deny that she had ambition, and ridiculous to claim for her the character of a saint. She was, in a word, a witty, graceful, well-read, fascinating female, vain of applause, a little free in her manners, a fast friend, and a bitter enemy. She never loved the king, as she might have loved Percy, had not Wolsey crossed her path, and converted her into a haughty, scheming, ambitious woman; but she never, on the other hand, violated her vows toward Henry, or failed in the discharge of any wifely duty. Her conduct during the two years that the divorce was in progress is the most censurable part of her life. We cannot forgive her for wringing the heart of the unoffending Catharine. Nor for her favor toward Henry at this time can we esteem her as we would have wished. But from the period that she became the lawful wife of the king her character visibly improves. She was affable to the low, courteous to the high, charitable to the needy, just to all. As her sorrows increase her character rises in loveliness; her frivolity is cast aside, the haughtiness departs, and the true nobleness of her heart shines forth. Nothing in history is more pathetic than the story of her arrest, trial, and execution. In a court where she had scarcely a friend, she bore herself with the fortitude of a martyr, asserting her innocence with an earnestness that carried conviction even to those who condemned her; and on the scaffold, though her over-wrought nerves occasionally found vent in hysterical gayety, her lofty and heroic soul triumphed over the terrible spectacle of the axe, the block, the gaping crowd. Her closing career, indeed, has all the grandeur of a tragedy. We read of it with eyes dim with tears, and with a heart execrating her murderers.

The volume is beautifully printed, and embellished with a portrait, copied from the celebrated picture of Holbein.

The original edition of this work was printed on such costly paper, and illustrated with so many engravings that hundreds of persons, who desired to purchase it, were withheld by the necessarily high price. To meet the wishes of this class, the present cheap edition has been issued. There has been no material change in the letter-press; the few alterations that have been made are for the better; but the engravings are omitted; the volume is printed on poorer paper, and the page is not quite so large. On the whole we think this edition more desirable than the first. So much valuable information is embraced in the narrative of Lieutenant Lynch, that persons curious respecting the Holy Land, and especially respecting the Dead Sea, will find themselves amply repaid by a perusal, and even a re-perusal of this work. Numerous popular fables respecting the Jordan, the Sea of Galilee, and the dread Lake of Gomorrah are exploded in this volume; and a mass of instructive evidence imparted respecting the geographical character of Palestine, its former fertility, and the general habits of its inhabitants. It is impossible to read this work without obtaining new light in the understanding of Scripture.

Andrew Combe was almost as universally celebrated for his works on physiology as his brother, George, is for his writings in connection with phrenology. The present biography is a tribute, by the elder brother, to the usefulness of the younger. As the story of a life, made beneficial to the human race through a compassionate and wise heart, and this amid constant ill-health, it is one of the most valuable offerings of the century to biographical literature. Apart from this, however, it has a merit in the narrative of Dr. Combe’s protracted illness, and the means used successfully by him to prolong life. An early victim to consumption, he arrested the progress of disease, and protracted his existence for more than twenty years, during which period all of his best works were written. The volume teaches two important lessons: the first, that in the study of physiology, alleviation may be found for much of human suffering; the second, that, even in sickness and sorrow, it is possible, instead of remaining entirely a burden to others, to be a benefactor of our race. We have read this work with deep interest, and believe it will afford equal satisfaction to others.

The author of this volume is known, in England, as a poet of some merit. In the present work he has attempted a new role, and has succeeded in it, we are free to confess, in the very best manner. Mr. De Vere is at once a scholar and a gentleman. The former qualification renders him a peculiarly fitting traveler on the classic soil of Greece; the latter enables him to depict what he has seen in a manner not offensive to good taste. We have had so many cockney books on Greece, we have seen flunkeyism so rampant even in Constantinople, that it is refreshing to find a work like the present, in which the knowledge of the man of the world, the stores of the student, and the enthusiasm of the poet are all combined. The volume first arrested our attention by its elegant appearance, and, having once begun it, we could not lay it aside till we had finished it. There is much in the book, it is true, which a well-read man will recognize as old; but then the style makes even this have an air of freshness. On the other hand the work really contains a good deal that is new.

A pleasant, perhaps instructive book, though this last is as people view it. For our part we hold that the way to make folk believe in ghosts is to cram them, especially in childhood, with stories of apparitions. Personally, we have little faith in phantoms. However “chacun à son gout;” and therefore, to those who like speculating about ghosts, we recommend this work.

We have here a number of lively and trustworthy sketches of public men, written in a style that reminds us of Grant’s sketches of The English Parliament. We had intended devoting some space to the work, as one peculiarly deserving consideration, but for want of room, are obliged to defer, and perhaps abandon our purpose.

This is a readable book, especially at this crisis, when Rochester knockings, Clairvoyance, and other wonders fill the public mind. The author has compiled a history of all the popular delusions, with which different generations have been misled; nor has he confined himself merely to mysteries like the knockings, but has discussed the South Sea Bubble, the Mississippi Scheme, and other vagaries of a similar character.

The publisher characterizes this work as a companion to the “Vestiges of Creation;” but he might, more justly, have described it as an antidote to that skeptical volume. We cordially recommend the book.

The author of this work is well known as an accomplished lecturer on history in the principal cities of the Northern and Middle States. The present work shows great power of compression as well as wealth of information. Though the work is designed for colleges and schools, it will be found of much value to the general reader as a guide to historical studies.

The author of this volume, though a political supporter of the late President, has written an interesting account of the important events which occurred in his administration. The partisan character of the work prevents it from coming properly under the name of “history,” but it contains a well arranged statement of a vast mass of facts, valuable both to the intelligent Whig and Democrat.

The second number of the third volume of this work is now before us. That which Judge Stryker undertook to perform he has faithfully complied with, and the public are now secure in the permanent existence of a periodical which will prove a treasury of information, and which was long since needed. The deficiency is now supplied, and ably supplied; and we can safely predict that it will command a liberal and generous support.

TO REV. RUFUS WILMOT GRISWOLD.

My dear Parson,—I knew you would be gratified with my friendly notice of you in the March number of “Graham”—and your pleasant start of surprise, to express your ignorance of the writer, was well conceived—you wicked wag. People who do not know your ways might almost think you were honest for once in your life,—but I, who have seen you in your happy moods, understand what an exquisite point to your wit a falsehood imparts, and what a choice bit of clerical drollery you consider it, to offer to swear to an untruth.

You have adjusted, now, your long score with poor Poe, to your own satisfaction, I hope; for ignorant people will say, that this settlement of accounts after the death of your friend may be honest—and—may not be. You see it lays you open to suspicion, and may soil the surplice you wear. Your clerical mantle, like Charity, may cover a multitude of sins, but you should not wear it too unguardedly. Charity for the errors of the dead, you know, is allowable in funeral sermons, even over the cold remains of those the world scorned and spurned as its veriest reprobates. Even you will not class your friend—who you say was reconciled to you before he died—with outcasts who forfeit even the last offices of humanity. You would give even him a Christian burial. “Dust to dust—ashes to ashes,” methinks, should bury all animosities. You would not pursue your victim beyond the grave, and in the same hour pray, “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.” This would be horrible.

Now it will not do, my dear parson, to attempt to carry off this departure from Christian practice, with an affectation of great equity, in the performance of duty. “Give the devil his due” may be a very orthodox maxim, but you seem, in adopting it, to have started with the hypothesis that you had a devil to deal with; yet in the exercise of justice thus liberally, it would seem but fair to meet even this Personage face to face, that he might dispute the account if he felt aggrieved at your estimate. This last point, I think, you have a fair chance of attaining. Nor will it do to affect courage and great devotion to truth. It is very well to say, that vice should be held up that its deformity may be seen, so as to startle and deter others. You should be sure that the vice of your brother is not his misfortune, and that the sin which taints your own fingers, may not turn crimson in contrast before the eyes of the gazers. Courage, my dear parson, is a relative term. You may think it great courage, and a duty you owe to truth, to assail your friend for wishing to evade a matrimonial engagement, yet it would be the veriest weakness and wickedness—if you had set the worse example of evading your marital duties after the solemnization. He who sacrifices at the altar should have clean hands.

The jewels which sometimes ornament the remains of beauty or worth have tempted, before now, gentlemen of hardy nerve, but I do not remember that these have ever taken rank in the annals of knight-errantry. And, my dear parson—I am talking somewhat freely with you, but you must pardon me—the feat that you have performed with so much unction, the despoiling of the fame of a man who intrusted it to you as a jewel of inestimable value to him, has not received the applause of a single man of honor. Your claqueurs themselves, feel that your performance is damned. I have no doubt that some faint glimpses of the truth have reached even your mind. I would have you pray over this subject, my dear sir, for your feet stand upon slippery places. In all sincerity, I would have you revise your creed and reform your practice; for you do not seem to get even the poor applause of the world, for wrong-doing.

Geo. R. Graham.

Philadelphia, Sept. 20, 1850.

Errata.—Our first form having been worked off previous to the reception of the final proof of the leading article, the following errors will be found:— On page 266, 1st column, 17th line from bottom, for “with” read wrote. Page 266, 2d col., 2d line from bottom, for “region” read reign. Page 267, 2d col., 30th line from top, for “physical” read psychical. Page 269, 1st col., 9th line from bottom for “profession” read possession.

Anaïs Toudouze                                                    

LE FOLLET     Boulevart S^t. Martin, 69.
Coiffures de Hamelin, pass. du Saumon, 21—Lingerie de la maison Schreiber, r. Montmartre, 32—Fleurs de Chagot, ainé, r. Richelieu 73.
Robes de M^me Verrier Richard, r. Richelieu, 13—Dentelles de Violard, rue Choiseul, 4.

STERLING ORIGINAL LITERATURE.

SPLENDID DEPARTMENT OF ART.

Transcriber’s Notes:

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