Passing through the principal streets, I told the contrabands that when they heard the court-house bell, which would ring soon, they must go to the court-house yard, where a communication would be made to them. In the mean time I secured the valuable services of some fellow-privates, one for a quarter-master, two others to aid in superintending at the trenches, and the orderly-sergeant of my own company, whose expertness in the drill was equalled only by his general good sense and business capacity. Upon the ringing of the bell, about forty contrabands came to the yard. A second exploration added to the number some twenty or more, who had not heard the original summons. They then came into the building, where they were called to order and addressed. I had argued to judges and juries, but I had never spoken to such auditors before in a court-room. I told them that the colored men had been employed on the breastworks of the Rebels, and we needed their aid,—that they would be required to do only such labor as we ourselves had done,—that they should be treated kindly, and no one should be obliged to work beyond his capacity, or if unwell,—and that they should be furnished in a day or two with full soldiers' rations. I told them that their masters had said they were an indolent people,—that I did not believe the charge,—that I was going home to Massachusetts soon and should be glad to report that they were as industrious as the whites. They generally showed no displeasure, some even saying, that, not having done much for some time, it was the best thing for them to be now employed. Four or five men over fifty years old said that they suffered from rheumatism, and could not work without injury. Being confirmed by the by-standers, they were dismissed. Other old men said they would do what they could, and they were assured that no more would be required of them. Two of them, provided with a bucket and dipper, were detailed to carry water all the time along the line of laborers. Two young men fretted a little, and claimed to be disabled in some way. They were told to resume their seats, and try first and see what they could do,—to the evident amusement of the rest, who knew them to be indolent and disposed to shirk. A few showed some sulkiness, but it all passed away after the first day, when they found that they were to be used kindly. One well-dressed young man, a carpenter, feeling a little better than his associates, did not wear a pleasant face at first. Finding out his trade, we set him to sawing the posts for the intrenchments, and he was entirely reconciled. Free colored men were not required to work; but one volunteered, wishing, as he said, to do his part. The contrabands complained that the free colored men ought to be required to work on the intrenchments as well as they. I thought so too, but followed my orders. A few expressed some concern lest their masters should punish them for serving us, if they ever returned. One inquired suspiciously why we took the name of his master. My reply was, that it was taken in order to identify them,—an explanation with which he was more satisfied than I was myself. Several were without shoes, and said that they could not drive the shovel into the earth. They were told to use the picks. The rest of the forenoon being occupied in registering their names and ages, and the names of their masters, they were dismissed to come together on the ringing of the bell, at two, P.M.

It had been expressly understood that I was to have the exclusive control and supervision of the negroes, directing their hours of labor and their rests, without interference from any one. The work itself was to be planned and superintended by the officers of the Third and Fourth Regiments. This exclusive control of the men was necessarily confided to one, as different lieutenants detailed each day could not feel a responsibility for their welfare. One or two of these, when rests were allowed the negroes, were somewhat disgusted, saying that negroes could dig all the time as well as not. I had had some years before an experience with the use of the shovel under a warm sun, and knew better, and I wished I could superintend a corps of lieutenants and apply their own theory to themselves.

At two, P.M., the contrabands came together, answered to their names, and, each taking a shovel, a spade, or a pick, began to work upon the breastworks farthest from the village and close to the new cemetery. The afternoon was very warm, the warmest we had in Hampton. Some, used only to household or other light work, wilted under the heat, and they were told to go into the cemetery and lie down. I remember distinctly a corpulent colored man, down whose cheeks the perspiration rolled and who said he felt badly. He also was told to go away and rest until he was better. He soon came back relieved, and there was no more faithful laborer among them all during the rest of the time. Twice or three times in the afternoon an intermission of fifteen minutes was allowed to all. Thus they worked until six in the evening, when they were dismissed for the day. They deposited their tools in the court-house, where each one of his own accord carefully put his pick or shovel where he could find it again,—sometimes behind a door and sometimes in a sly corner or under a seat, preferring to keep his own tool. They were then informed that they must come together on the ringing of the bell the next morning at four o'clock. They thought that too early, but they were assured that the system best for their health would be adopted, and they would afterwards be consulted about changing it. The next morning we did not rise quite so early as four, and the bell was not rung till some minutes later. The contrabands were prompt, their names had been called, and they had marched to the trenches, a quarter of a mile distant, and were fairly at work by half-past four or a quarter before five. They did excellent service during the morning hours, and at seven were dismissed till eight. The roll was then called again, absences, if any, noted, and by half-past eight they were at their post. They continued at the trenches till eleven, being allowed rests, and were then dismissed until three, P.M., being relieved four hours in the middle of the day, when, the bell being rung and the roll called, they resumed their work and continued till six, when they were dismissed for the day. Such were the hours and usual course of their labor. Their number was increased some half dozen by fugitives from the back-country, who came in and asked to be allowed to serve on the intrenchments.

The contrabands worked well, and in no instance was it found necessary for the superintendents to urge them. There was a public opinion among them against idleness, which answered for discipline. Some days they worked with our soldiers, and it was found that they did more work, and did the nicer parts—the facings and dressings—better. Colonels Packard and Wardrop, under whose direction the breastworks were constructed, and General Butler, who visited them, expressed satisfaction at the work which the contrabands had done. On the 14th of July, Mr. Russell, of the London "Times," and Dr. Bellows, of the Sanitary Commission, came to Hampton and manifested much interest at the success of the experiment. The result was, indeed, pleasing. A subaltern officer, to whom I had insisted that the contrabands should be treated with kindness, had sneered at the idea of applying philanthropic notions in time of war. It was found then, as always, that decent persons will accomplish more when treated at least like human beings. The same principle, if we will but credit our own experience and Mr. Rarey, too, may with advantage be extended to our relations with the beasts that serve us.

Three days after the contrabands commenced their work, five days' rations were served to them,—a soldier's ration for each laborer, and half a ration for each dependant. The allowance was liberal,—as a soldier's ration, if properly cooked, is more than he generally needs, and the dependant for whom a half-ration was received might be a wife or a half-grown child. It consisted of salt beef or pork, hard bread, beans, rice, coffee, sugar, soap, and candles, and where the family was large it made a considerable pile. The recipients went home, appearing perfectly satisfied, and feeling assured that our promises to them would be performed. On Sunday fresh meat was served to them in the same manner as to the troops.

There was one striking feature in the contrabands which must not be omitted. I did not hear a profane or vulgar word spoken by them during my superintendence, a remark which it will be difficult to make of any sixty-four white men taken together anywhere in our army. Indeed, the greatest discomfort of a soldier, who desires to remain a gentleman in the camp, is the perpetual reiteration of language which no decent lips would utter in a sister's presence. But the negroes, so dogmatically pronounced unfit for freedom, were in this respect models for those who make high boasts of civility of manners and Christian culture. Out of the sixty-four who worked for us, all but half a dozen were members of the Church, generally the Baptist. Although without a pastor, they held religious meetings on the Sundays which we passed in Hampton, which were attended by about sixty colored persons and three hundred soldiers. The devotions were decorously conducted, bating some loud shouting by one or two excitable brethren, which the better sense of the rest could not suppress. Their prayers and exhortations were fervent, and marked by a simplicity which is not infrequently the richest eloquence. The soldiers behaved with entire propriety, and two exhorted them with pious unction, as children of one Father, ransomed by the same Redeemer.

To this general propriety of conduct among the contrabands intrusted to me there was only one exception, and that was in the case of Joe ——; his surname I have forgotten. He was of a vagrant disposition, and an inveterate shirk. He had a plausible speech and a distorted imagination, and might be called a demagogue among darkies. He bore an ill physiognomy,—that of one "fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils." He was disliked by the other contrabands, and had been refused admission to their Church, which he wished to join in order to get up a character. Last, but not least, among his sins, he was accustomed to boat his wife, of which she accused him in my presence; whereupon he justified himself on the brazen assumption that all husbands did the same. There was no good reason to believe that he had already been tampered with by Rebels; but his price could not be more than five dollars. He would be a disturbing element among the laborers on the breastworks, and he was a dangerous person to be so near the lines; we therefore sent him to the fort. The last I heard of him, he was at the Rip Raps, bemoaning his isolation, and the butt of our soldiers there, who charged him with being a "Secesh," and confounded him by gravely asserting that they were such themselves and had seen him with the "Secesh" at Yorktown. This was the single goat among the sheep.

On Monday evening, July 15th, when the contrabands deposited their tools in the court-house, I requested them to stop a moment in the yard. I made each a present of some tobacco, which all the men and most of the women use. As they gathered in a circle around me, head peering over head, I spoke to them briefly, thanking them for their cordial work and complimenting their behavior, remarking that I had heard no profane or vulgar word from them, in which they were an example to us,—adding that it was the last time I should meet them, as we were to march homeward in the morning, and that I should bear to my people a good report of their industry and morals. There was another word that I could not leave without speaking. Never before in our history had a Northern man, believing in the divine right of all men to their liberty, had an opportunity to address an audience of sixty-four slaves and say what the Spirit moved him to utter,—and I should have been false to all that is true and sacred, if I had let it pass. I said to them that there was one more word for me to add, and that was, that every one of them was as much entitled to his freedom as I was to mine, and I hoped they would all now secure it. "Believe you, boss," was the general response, and each one with his rough gravelly hand grasped mine, and with tearful eyes and broken utterances said, "God bless you!" "May we meet in Heaven!" "My name is Jack Allen, don't forget me!" "Remember me, Kent Anderson!" and so on. No,—I may forget the playfellows of my childhood, my college classmates, my professional associates, my comrades in arms, but I will remember you and your benedictions until I cease to breathe! Farewell, honest hearts, longing to be free! and may the kind Providence which for-gets not the sparrow shelter and protect you!

During our encampment at Hampton, I occupied much of my leisure time in conversations with the contrabands, both at their work and in their shanties, endeavoring to collect their currents of thought and feeling. It remains for me to give the results, so far as any could be arrived at.

There were more negroes of unmixed African blood than we expected to find. But many were entirely bleached. One man, working on the breastworks, owned by his cousin, whose name he bore, was no darker than white laborers exposed by their occupation to the sun, and could not be distinguished as of negro descent. Opposite our quarters was a young slave woman who had been three times a mother without ever having been a wife. You could not discern in her three daughters, either in color, feature, or texture of hair, the slightest trace of African lineage. They were as light-faced and fair-haired as the Saxon slaves whom the Roman Pontiff, Gregory the Great, met in the markets of Rome. If they were to be brought here and their pedigree concealed, they could readily mingle with our population and marry white men, who would never suspect that they were not pure Caucasians.

From the best knowledge I could obtain, the negroes in Hampton had rarely been severely whipped. A locust-tree in front of the jail had been used for a whipping-post, and they were very desirous that it should be cut down. It was used, however, only for what are known there as flagrant offences, like running away. Their masters, when in ill-temper, had used rough language and inflicted chance blows, but no one ever told me that he had suffered from systematic cruelty or been severely whipped, except Joe, whose character I have given. Many of them bore testimony to the great kindness of their masters and mistresses.

Separations of families had been frequent. Of this I obtained definite knowledge. When I was registering the number of dependants, preparatory to the requisition for rations, the answer occasionally was, "Yes, I have a wife, but she is not here." "Where is she?" "She was sold off two years ago, and I have not heard of her since." The husband of the woman who took care of the quarters of General Pierce had been sold away from her some years before. Such separations are regarded as death, and the slaves re-marry. In some cases the bereft one—so an intelligent negro assured me—pines under his bereavement and loses his value; but so elastic is human nature that this did not appear to be generally the case. The same answer was given about children,—that they had been sold away. This, in a slave-breeding country, is done when they are about eight years old. Can that be a mild system of servitude which permits such enforced separations? Providence may, indeed, sunder forever those dearest to each other, and the stricken soul accepts the blow as the righteous discipline of a Higher Power; but when the bereavement is the arbitrary dictate of human will, there are no such consolations to sanctify grief and assuage agony.

There is a universal desire among the slaves to be free. Upon this point my inquiries were particular, and always with the same result. When we said to them, "You don't want to be free,—your masters say you don't,"—they manifested much indignation, answering, "We do want to be free,—we want to be for ourselves." We inquired further, "Do the house slaves who wear their master's clothes want to be free?" "We never heard of one who did not," was the instant reply. There might be, they said, some half-crazy one who did not care to be free, but they had never seen one. Even old men and women, with crooked backs, who could hardly walk or see, shared the same feeling. An intelligent Secessionist, Lowry by name, who was examined at head-quarters, admitted that a majority of the slaves wanted to be free. The more intelligent the slave and the better he had been used, the stronger this desire seemed to be. I remember one such particularly, the most intelligent one in Hampton, known as "an, influential darky" ("darky" being the familiar term applied by the contrabands to themselves). He could read, was an exhorter in the Church, and officiated in the absence of the minister. He would have made a competent juryman. His mistress, he said, had been kind to him, and had never spoken so harshly to him as a captain's orderly in the Naval Brigade had done, who assumed one day to give him orders. She had let him work where he pleased, and he was to bring her a fixed sum, and appropriate the surplus to his own use. She pleaded with him to go away with her from Hampton at the time of the exodus, but she would not force him to leave his family. Still he hated to be a slave, and he talked like a philosopher about his rights. No captive in the galleys of Algiers, not Lafayette in an Austrian dungeon, ever pined more for free air. He had saved eighteen hundred dollars of his surplus earnings in attending on visitors at Old Point, and had spent it all in litigation to secure the freedom of his wife and children, belonging to another master, whose will had emancipated them, but was contested on the ground of the insanity of the testator. He had won a verdict, but his lawyers told him they could not obtain a judgment upon it, as the judge was unfavorable to freedom.

The most frequent question asked of one who has had any means of communication with the contrabands during the war is in relation to their knowledge of its cause and purposes, and their interest in it. One thing was evident,—indeed, you could not talk with a slave who did not without prompting give the same testimony,—that their masters had been most industrious in their attempts to persuade them that the Yankees were coming down there only to get the land,—that they would kill the negroes and manure the ground with them, or carry them off to Cuba or Hayti and sell them. An intelligent man who had belonged to Colonel Joseph Segar—almost the only Union man at heart in that region, and who for that reason, being in Washington at the time the war began, had not dared to return to Hampton—served the staff of General Pierce. He bore the highest testimony to the kindness of his master, who, he said, told him to remain,—that the Yankees were the friends of his people, and would use them well. "But," said David,—for that was his name,—"I never heard of any other master who talked that way, but they all told the worst stories about the Yankees, and the mistresses were more furious even than the masters." David, I may add, spite of his good master, longed to be free.

The masters, in their desperation, had within a few months resorted to another device to secure the loyalty of their slaves. The colored Baptist minister had been something of a pet among the whites, and had obtained subscriptions from some benevolent citizens to secure the freedom of a handsome daughter of his who was exposed to sale on an auction block, where her beauty inspired competition. Some leading Secessionists, Lawyer Hope for one, working somewhat upon his gratitude and somewhat upon his vanity, persuaded him to offer the services of himself and his sons, in a published communication, to the cause of Virginia and the Confederate States. The artifice did not succeed. He lost his hold on his congregation, and could not have safely remained after the whites left. He felt uneasy about his betrayal, and tried to restore himself to favor by saying that he meant no harm to his people; but his protestations were in vain. His was the deserved fate of those in all ages who, victims of folly or bribes, turn their backs on their fellows.

Notwithstanding all these attempts, the negroes, with rare exceptions, still believed that the Yankees were their friends. They had learned something in Presidential elections, and they thought their masters could not hate us as they did, unless we were their friends. They believed that the troubles would somehow or other help them, although they did not understand all that was going on. They may be pardoned for their want of apprehension, when some of our public men, almost venerable, and reputed to be very wise and philosophical, are bewildered and grope blindly. They were somewhat perplexed by the contradictory statements of our soldiers, some of whom, according to their wishes, said the contest was for them, and others that it did not concern them at all and they would remain as before. If it was explained to them, that Lincoln was chosen by a party who were opposed to extending slavery, but who were also opposed to interfering with it in Virginia,—that Virginia and the South had rebelled, and we had come to suppress the rebellion,—and although the object of the war was not to emancipate them, yet that might be its result,—they answered, that they understood the statement perfectly. They did not seem inclined to fight, although willing to work. More could not be expected of them while nothing is promised to them. What latent inspirations they may have remains to be seen. They had at first a mysterious dread of fire-arms, but familiarity is rapidly removing that.

The religious element of their life has been noticed. They said they had prayed for this day, and God had sent Lincoln in answer to their prayers. We used to overhear their family devotions, somewhat loud according to their manner, in which they prayed earnestly for our troops. They built their hopes of freedom on Scriptural examples, regarding the deliverance of Daniel from the lions' den, and of the Three Children from the furnace, as symbolic of their coming freedom. One said to me, that masters, before they died, by their wills sometimes freed their slaves, and he thought that a type that they should become free.

One Saturday evening one of them asked me to call and see him at his home the next morning. I did so, and he handed me a Bible belonging to his mistress, who had died a few days before, and whose bier I had helped to carry to the family vault. He wanted me to read to him the eleventh chapter of Daniel. It seemed, that, as one of the means of keeping them quiet, the white clergymen during the winter and spring had read them some verses from it to show that the South would prevail, enforcing passages which ascribed great dominion to "the king of the South," and suppressing those which subsequently give the supremacy to "the king of the North." A colored man who could read had found the latter passages and made them known. The chapter is dark with mystery, and my auditor, quite perplexed as I read on, remarked, "The Bible is a very mysterious book." I read to him also the thirty-fourth chapter of Jeremiah, wherein the sad prophet of Israel records the denunciations by Jehovah of sword, pestilence, and famine against the Jews for not proclaiming liberty to their servants and handmaids. He had not known before that there were such passages in the Bible.

The conversations of the contrabands on their title to be regarded as freemen showed reflection. When asked if they thought themselves fit for freedom, and if the darkies were not lazy, their answer was, "Who but the darkies cleared all the land round here? Yes, there are lazy darkies, but there are more lazy whites." When told that the free blacks had not succeeded, they answered that the free blacks have not had a fair chance under the laws,—that they don't dare to enforce their claims against white men,—that a free colored blacksmith had a thousand dollars due to him from white men, but he was afraid to sue for any portion of it. One man, when asked why he ought to be free, replied,—"I feed and clothe myself and pay my master one hundred and twenty dollars a year; and the one hundred and twenty dollars is just so much taken from me, which ought to be used to make me and my children comfortable." Indeed, broken as was their speech and limited as was their knowledge, they reasoned abstractly on their rights as well as white men. Locke or Channing might have fortified the argument for universal liberty from their simple talk. So true is it that the best thoughts which the human intellect has produced have come, not from affluent learning or ornate speech, but from the original elements of our nature, common to all races of men and all conditions in life; and genius the highest and most cultured may bend with profit to catch the lowliest of human utterances.

There was a very general desire among the contrabands to know how to read. A few had learned; and these, in every instance where we inquired as to their teacher, had been taught on the sly in their childhood by their white playmates. Others knew their letters, but could not "put them together," as they said. I remember of a summer's afternoon seeing a young married woman, perhaps twenty-five years old, seated on a door-step with her primer before her, trying to make progress.

In natural tact and the faculty of getting a livelihood the contrabands are inferior to the Yankees, but quite equal to the mass of the Southern population. It is not easy to see why they would be less industrious, if free, than the whites, particularly as they would have the encouragement of wages. There would be transient difficulties at the outset, but no more than a bad system lasting for ages might be expected to leave behind. The first generation might be unfitted for the active duties and responsibilities of citizenship; but this difficulty, under generous provisions for education, would not pass to the next. Even now they are not so much behind the masses of the whites. Of the Virginians who took the oath of allegiance at Hampton, not more than one in fifteen could write his name, and the rolls captured at Hatteras disclose an equally deplorable ignorance. The contrabands might be less addicted than the now dominant race to bowie-knives and duels, think less of the value of bludgeons as forensic arguments, be less inhospitable to innocent sojourners from Free States, and have far inferior skill in robbing forts and arsenals, plundering the Treasury, and betraying the country at whose crib they had fattened; but mankind would forgive them for not acquiring these accomplishments of modern treason. As a race, they may be less vigorous and thrifty than the Saxon, but they are more social, docile, and affectionate, fulfilling the theory which Channing held in relation to them, if advanced to freedom and civilization.

If in the progress of the war they should be called to bear arms, there need be no reasonable apprehension that they would exhibit the ferocity of savage races. Unlike such, they have been subordinated to civilized life. They are by nature a religious people. They have received an education in the Christian faith from devout teachers of their own and of the dominant race. Some have been taught (let us believe it) by the precepts of Christian masters, and some by the children of those masters, repeating the lessons of the Sabbath-school. The slaveholders assure us that they have all been well treated. If that be so, they have no wrongs to avenge. Associated with our army, they would conform to the stronger and more disciplined race. Nor is this view disproved by servile insurrections. In those cases, the insurgents, without arms, without allies, without discipline, but throwing themselves against society, against government, against everything, saw no other escape than to devastate and destroy without mercy in order to get a foothold. If they exterminated, it was because extermination was threatened against them. In the Revolution, in the army at Cambridge, from the beginning to the close of the war, against the protests of South Carolina by the voice of Edward Rutledge, but with the express sanction of Washington,—ever just, ever grateful for patriotism, whencesoever it came,—the negroes fought in the ranks with the white men, and they never dishonored the patriot cause. So also at the defence of New Orleans they received from General Jackson a noble tribute to their fidelity and soldier-like bearing. Weighing the question historically and reflectively, and anticipating the capture of Richmond and New Orleans, there need be more serious apprehension of the conduct of some of our own troops recruited in large cities than of a regiment of contrabands officered and disciplined by white men.

But as events travel faster than laws or proclamations, already in this war with Rebellion the two races have served together. The same breastworks have been built by their common toil. True and valiant, they stood side by side in the din of cannonade, and they shared as comrades in the victory of Hatteras. History will not fail to record that on the 28th day of August, 1861, when the Rebel forts were bombarded by the Federal army and navy, under the command of Major-General Butler and Commodore Stringham, fourteen negroes, lately Virginia slaves, now contraband of war, faithfully and without panic worked the after-gun of the upper deck of the Minnesota, and hailed with a victor's pride the Stars and Stripes as they again waved on the soil of the Carolinas.



THE WASHERS OF THE SHROUD.

Along a river-side, I know not where, I walked last night in mystery of dream; A chill creeps curdling yet beneath my hair, To think what chanced me by the pallid gleam Of a moon-wraith that waned through haunted air.

Pale fire-flies pulsed within the meadow mist Their halos, wavering thistle-downs of light; The loon, that seemed to mock some goblin tryst, Laughed; and the echoes, huddling in affright, Like Odin's hounds, fled baying down the night.

Then all was silent, till there smote my ear A movement in the stream that checked my breath: Was it the slow plash of a wading deer? But something said, "This water is of Death! The Sisters wash a Shroud,—ill thing to hear!"

I, looking then, beheld the ancient Three, Known to the Greek's and to the Norseman's creed, That sit in shadow of the mystic Tree, Still crooning, as they weave their endless brede, One song: "Time was, Time is, and Time shall be."

No wrinkled crones were they, as I had deemed, But fair as yesterday, to-day, to-morrow, To mourner, lover, poet, ever seemed; Something too deep for joy, too high for sorrow, Thrilled in their tones and from their faces gleamed.

"Still men and nations reap as they have strawn,"— So sang they, working at their task the while,— "The fatal raiment must be cleansed ere dawn: For Austria? Italy? the Sea-Queen's Isle? O'er what quenched grandeur must our shroud be drawn?

"Or is it for a younger, fairer corse, That gathered States for children round his knees, That tamed the wave to be his posting-horse, The forest-feller, linker of the seas, Bridge-builder, hammerer, youngest son of Thor's?

"What make we, murmur'st thou, and what are we? When empires must be wound, we bring the shroud, The time-old web of the implacable Three: Is it too coarse for him, the young and proud? Earth's mightiest deigned to wear it; why not he?"

"Is there no hope?" I moaned. "So strong, so fair! Our Fowler, whose proud bird would brook erewhile No rival's swoop in all our western air! Gather the ravens, then, in funeral file, For him, life's morn-gold bright yet in his hair?

"Leave me not hopeless, ye unpitying dames! I see, half-seeing. Tell me, ye who scanned The stars, Earth's elders, still must noblest aims Be traced upon oblivious ocean-sands? Must Hesper join the wailing ghosts of names?"

"When grass-blades stiffen with red battle-dew, Ye deem we choose the victors and the slain: Say, choose we them that shall be leal and true To the heart's longing, the high faith of brain? Yet here the victory is, if ye but knew.

"Three roots bear up Dominion: Knowledge, Will,— These two are strong, but stronger yet the third,— Obedience, the great tap-root, that still, Knit round the rock of Duty, is not stirred, Though the storm's ploughshare spend its utmost skill.

"Is the doom sealed for Hesper? 'T is not we Denounce it, but the Law before all time: The brave makes danger opportunity; The waverer, paltering with the chance sublime, Dwarfs it to peril: which shall Hesper be?

"Hath he let vultures climb his eagle's seat To make Jove's bolts purveyors of their maw? Hath he the Many's plaudits found more sweet Than wisdom? held Opinion's wind for law? Then let him hearken for the headsman's feet!

"Rough are the steps, slow-hewn in flintiest rock, States climb to power by; slippery those with gold Down which they stumble to eternal mock: No chafferer's hand shall long the sceptre hold, Who, given a Fate to shape, would sell the block.

"We sing old sagas, songs of weal and woe, Mystic because too cheaply understood; Dark sayings are not ours; men hear and know, See Evil weak, see only strong the Good, Yet hope to balk Doom's fire with walls of tow.

"Time Was unlocks the riddle of Time Is, That offers choice of glory and of gloom; The solver makes Time Shall Be surely his.— But hasten, Sisters! for even now the tomb Grates its slow hinge and calls from the abyss."

"But not for him," I cried, "not yet for him, Whose large horizon, westering, star by star Wins from the void to where on ocean's rim The sunset shuts the world with golden bar,— Not yet his thews shall fail, his eye grow dim!

"His shall be larger manhood, saved for those That walk unblenching through the trial-fires; Not suffering, but faint heart is worst of woes, And he no base-born son of craven sires, Whose eye need droop, confronted with his foes.

"Tears may be ours, but proud, for those who win Death's royal purple in the enemy's lines: Peace, too, brings tears; and 'mid the battle-din, The wiser ear some text of God divines; For the sheathed blade may rust with darker sin.

"God, give us peace!—not such as lulls to sleep, But sword on thigh, and brow with purpose knit! And let our Ship of State to harbor sweep, Her ports all up, her battle-lanterns lit, And her leashed thunders gathering for their leap!"

So said I, with clenched hands and passionate pain, Thinking of dear ones by Potomac's side: Again the loon laughed, mocking; and again The echoes bayed far down the night, and died, While waking I recalled my wandering brain.

* * * * *

REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES.

Sermons preached in the Chapel of Harvard College. By JAMES WALKER, D.D. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 12mo.

The great reputation which Dr. Walker has long enjoyed, as one of the most impressive pulpit orators of the country, will suffer little diminution by the publication of these specimens of his rare powers of statement, argument, and illustration. To the general reader, they are, to be sure, deprived of the fascination of his voice and manner; but as the peculiarities of his elocution have their source in the peculiarities of his mental and moral organization, it will be found that the style and structure of these printed sermons suggest the mule of their delivery, which is simply the emphatic utterance of emphatic thought. The Italicized words, with which the volume abounds, palpably mark the results of thinking, and arrest attention because they are not less emphasized by the intellect than by the type. In reflecting Dr. Walker's mind, the work at the same time reflects his manner.

Every reader of these sermons will be struck by their thorough reasonableness,—a reasonableness which does not exclude, but includes, the deepest and warmest religious sensibility. Moral and religious feeling pervades every statement; but the feeling is still confined within a flexible framework of argument, which, while it enlarges with every access of emotion, is always an outlying boundary of thought, beyond which passion does not pass. Light continually asserts itself as more comprehensive in its reach than heat; and the noblest spiritual instincts and impulses are never allowed unchecked expression as sentiments, but have to submit to the restraints imposed by principles. Even in the remarkable sermon entitled, "The Heart more than the Head," it will be found that it is the head which legitimates the action of the heart. The sentiments are exalted above the intellect by a process purely intellectual, and the inferiority of the reason is shown to be a principle essentially reasonable. Thus, throughout the volume, the author's mental insight into the complex phenomena of our spiritual nature is always accompanied by a mental oversight of its actual and possible aberrations. A sound, large, "round-about" common sense, keen, eager, vigilant, sagacious, encompasses all the emotional elements of his thought. He has a subtile sense of mystery, but he is not a mystic. The most marvellous workings of the Divine Spirit he apprehends under the conditions of Law, and even in the raptures of devotion he never forgets the relation of cause and effect.

The style of these sermons is what might be expected from the character of the mind it expresses. If Dr. Walker were not a thinker, it is plain that he could never have been a rhetorician. He has no power at all as a writer, if writing be considered an accomplishment which can be separated from earnest thinking. Words are, with him, the mere instruments for the expression of things; and he hits on felicitous words only under that impatient stress of thought which demands exact expression for definite ideas. All his words, simple as they are, are therefore fairly earned, and he gives to them a force and significance which they do not bear in the dictionary. The mind of the writer is felt beating and burning beneath his phraseology, stamping every word with the image of a thought. Largeness of intellect, acute discrimination, clear and explicit statement, masterly arrangement of matter, an unmistakable performance of the real business of expression,—these qualities make every reader of the sermons conscious that a mind of great vigor, breadth, and pungency is brought into direct contact with his own. The almost ostentatious absence of "fine writing" only increases the effect of the plain and sinewy words.

If we pass from the form to the substance of Dr. Walker's teachings, we shall find that his sermons are especially characterized by practical wisdom. A scholar, a moralist, a metaphysician, a theologian, learned in all the lore and trained in the best methods of the schools, he is distinguished from most scholars by his broad grasp of every-day life. It is this quality which has given him his wide influence as a preacher, and this is a prominent charm of his printed sermons. He brings principles to the test of facts, and connects thoughts with things. The conscience which can easily elude the threats, the monitions, and the appeals of ordinary sermonizers, finds itself mastered by his mingled fervor, logic, and practical knowledge. Every sermon in the present volume is good for use, and furnishes both inducements and aids to the formation of manly Christian character. There is much, of course, to lift the depressed and inspire the weak; but the great peculiarity of the discourses is the resolute energy with which they grapple with the worldliness and sin of the proud and the strong.

The Monks of the West, from St. Benedict to St. Bernard. By the COUNT DE MONTALEMBERT, Member of the French Academy. Authorized Translation. Volumes I. and II. Edinburgh and London: W. Blackwood & Sons. 1861. 8vo. pp. xii. and 515, 549.

These volumes form the first instalment of a work in which one of the great lights of the Romish Church in our day proposes to recount the glories of Western Monasticism, and to narrate the lives of some of the remarkable men who successively passed from the cloister to the Papal throne, or in positions scarcely less conspicuous permanently affected the history of the Church. His original design, however, does not appear to have extended beyond writing the life of St. Bernard of Clairvaux, which he intended to make in some measure a complement to his life of St. Elizabeth of Hungary. But he judged rightly, that, in order to exhibit the character and influence of that remarkable man under all their various aspects, it was needful at the outset to retrace the early history of monastic institutions in the West, and to show how far they tended to prepare the way for such a man. Only a part of this preliminary task has been accomplished as yet; but enough has been done to show in what spirit the historian has approached his subject, how thoroughly he has explored the original sources of information, and what will probably be the real worth of his labors. For such a work Montalembert possesses adequate and in some respects peculiar qualifications. His learning, eloquence, and candor will be conceded by every one who is familiar with his previous writings or with his public life; and at the same time he unites a passionate love of liberty, everywhere apparent in his book, with a zeal for the Church, worthy of any of the monks whom he commemorates. While his narrative is always animated and picturesque, and often rises into passages of fervid eloquence, he has conducted his researches with the unwearied perseverance of a mere antiquary, and has exhausted every source of information. "Every word which I have written," he says, "has been drawn from original and contemporary sources; and if I have quoted facts or expressions from second-hand authors, it has never been without attentively verifying the original or completing the text. A single date, quotation, or note, apparently insignificant, has often cost me hours and sometimes days of labor. I have never contented myself with being approximately right, nor resigned myself to doubt until every chance of arriving at certainty was exhausted." To the spirit and temper in which the book is written no well-founded exception can be taken; but considerable abatement must be made from the author's estimate of the services rendered by the monks to Christian civilization, and no Protestant will accept his views as to the permanent worth of monastic institutions. With this qualification, and with some allowance for needless repetitions, we cannot but regard his work as a most attractive and eloquent contribution to ecclesiastical history.

About half of the first volume is devoted to a General Introduction, explanatory of the origin and design of the work, but mainly intended to paint the character of monastic institutions, to describe the happiness of a religious life, and to examine the charges brought against the monks. These topics are considered in ten chapters, filled with curious details, and written with an eloquence and an earnestness which it is difficult for the reader to resist. Following this we have a short and brilliant sketch of the social and political condition of the Roman Empire after the conversion of Constantine, exhibiting by a few masterly touches its wide-spread corruption, the feebleness of its rulers, and the utter degradation of the people. The next two books treat of the Monastic Precursors in the East as well as in the West, and present a series of brief biographical sketches of the most famous monks, from St. Anthony, the father of Eastern monasticism, to St. Benedict, the earliest legislator for the monasteries of the West. Among the illustrious men who pass before us in this review, and all of whom are skilfully delineated, are Basil of Caesarea and his friend Gregory Nazianzen, Chrysostom, Jerome, Augustine, Athanasius, Martin of Tours, and the numerous company of saints and doctors nurtured in the great monastery of Lerins. And though an account of the saintly women who have led lives of seclusion would scarcely seem to be included under the title of Montalembert's work, he does not neglect to add sketches of the most conspicuous of them,—Euphrosyne, Pelagia, Marcella, Furia, and others. These preliminary sketches fill the last half of the first volume.

The Fourth Book comprises an account of the Life and Rule of St. Benedict, and properly opens the history which Montalembert proposes to narrate. It presents a sufficiently minute sketch of the personal history of Benedict and his immediate followers; but its chief merit is in its very ample and satisfactory exposition of the Benedictine Rule. The next book traces the history of monastic institutions in Italy and Spain during the sixth and seventh centuries, and includes biographical notices of Cassiodorus, the founder of the once famous monastery of Viviers in Calabria, of St. Gregory the Great, of Leander, Bishop of Seville, and his brother Isidore, of Ildefonso of Toledo, and of many others of scarcely less renown in the early monastic records. The Sixth Book is devoted to the monks under the first Merovingians, and is divided into five sections, treating respectively of the conquest of Gaul by the Franks, of the arrival of St. Maur in Anjou and the propagation of the Benedictine rule there, of the relations previously existing between the monks and the Merovingians, of St. Radegund and her followers, and of the services of the monks in clearing the forests and opening the way for the advance of civilization. The Seventh Book records the life of St. Columbanus, and describes at much length his labors in Gaul, as well as those of his disciples, both in the great monastery of Luxeuil and in the numerous colonies which issued from it and spread over the whole neighborhood, bringing the narrative down to the close of the seventh century. At this point the portion of Montalembert's work now published terminates, leaving, we presume, several additional volumes to follow. For their appearance we shall look with much interest. If the remainder is executed in the same spirit as the portion now before us, and is marked by the same diligent study of the original authorities and the same persuasive eloquence, it will form one of the most valuable of the many attractive monographs which we owe to the French historians of our time, and will be read with equal interest by Catholics and Protestants.

Eighty Years' Progress of the United States, showing the Various Channels of Industry and Education through which the People of the United States have arisen from a British Colony to their Present National Importance. Illustrated with over Two Hundred Engravings. New York: 51 John Street. Worcester: L. Stebbins. Two Volumes. 8vo.

A vast amount of useful information is treasured up in these two national volumes. Agriculture, commerce and trade, the cultivation of cotton, education, the arts of design, banking, mining, steam, the fur-trade, etc., are subjects of interest everywhere, and the present writers seem to be specially competent for the task they have assumed. If the household library should possess such books more frequently, less ignorance would prevail on topics concerning which every American ought to be well-informed. Woful silence usually prevails when a foreigner asks for statistics on any point connected with our industrial progress, and very few take the trouble to get at facts which are easy enough to be had with a little painstaking. We are glad to see so much good material brought together as we find in these two well-filled volumes.

Electro-Physiology and Electro-Therapeutics: Showing the Rules and Methods for the Employment of Galvanism in Nervous Diseases, etc. Second Edition, with Additions. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 1861.

At a time when the partition-wall between Jew and Gentile of the medical world is pretty thoroughly breached, if not thrown down, and quackery and imposture are tolerated as necessary evils, it is agreeable to meet with a real work of science, emanating from the labors of a regular physician, concerning the influences exerted by electricity on the human body, both in health and disease.

Electricity is one of the great powers of Nature, pervading all matter, existing in all mineral, vegetable, and animal bodies, not only acting in the combinations of the elements and molecules, but also serving as a means for their separation from each other. This imponderable fluid or power, whatever it may be, whether one or two, or a polarization of one force into the states + and -, is one of the most active agencies known to man, and although not capable of being weighed in the balance, is not found wanting anywhere in Nature. It courses in great currents beneath our feet, in the solid rocks of the earth, penetrating to the very interior of the globe, while it also rushes through our atmosphere in lurid flashes, and startles us with the crash and roar of heaven's artillery. It gives magnetic polarity to the earth, and directs the needle by its influence; for magnetic attraction is only an effect of the earth's thermo-electricity, excited by the sun's rays acting in a continuous course. Both animal and vegetable life are dependent on electric forces for their development; and many of their functions, directly or indirectly, result from their agency.

If this force controls to a great degree the living functions of our organs in their healthy action, it must be that it is concerned in those derangements and lesions which constitute disease and abnormal actions or disorders. It must have a remedial and the opposite effect, according as it is applied.

Is such a gigantic power to be left in the hands of charlatans, or shall it be reserved for application by scientific physicians? This is a question we must meet and answer practically.

It may be asked why a force of this nature has been so long neglected by practising physicians. The answer is very simple, and will be recognized as true by all middle-aged physicians in this country.

For the past fifty years it has been customary to state in lectures in our medical colleges, that "chemistry has nothing to do with medicine"; and since our teachers knew nothing of the subject themselves, they denounced such knowledge as unnecessary to the physician. Electricity, the great moving power in all chemical actions, shared the fate of chemistry in general, and met with condemnation without trial. A young physician did not dare to meddle with chemicals or with any branch of natural or experimental science for fear of losing his chance of medical employment by sinking the doctor among his gallipots.

Electricity, thus neglected, fell into the hands of irregular practitioners, and was as often used injuriously as beneficially, and more frequently without any effect. The absurd pretensions of galvanic baths for the extraction of mercury from the system will be remembered by most of our citizens, and the shocking practice of others is not forgotten.

It was therefore earnestly desired by medical practitioners who themselves were not by education competent to manage electric and galvanic machinery, that some medical man of good standing, who had made a special study of this subject, should undertake the treatment of diseases requiring the use of electricity. Dr. Garratt was induced to undertake this important duty, and he has prepared a work on this practice which embraces all that has appeared in the writings of others, both in this country and Europe, while he has, from his own researches and rich experience, added much new matter of great practical value. Among his original contributions we note,—

1st. A definite, systematic method for the application of Galvanic and Faradaic currents of electricity to the human organism, for curing or aiding in the cure of given classes of diseases. (See pages 475, 479, and 669 to 706; also Chap. 5, p. 280.)

2d. Improvements in the methods of applying electricity, as stated on pages 293 to 296, and 300, 329, and 332, which we have not room to copy.

3d. He has introduced the term Faradaic current to represent the induced current, first discovered by Professor Henry, and so much extended in application by Faraday.

4th. The determination of several definite points in sentient and mixed nerves, often the seats of neuralgic pain,—thus correcting Dr. Valleix's painful points.

5th. The treatment of uterine, and some other female disorders, by means of the induced galvanic current (pages 612 to 621).

A careful examination of this book shows it to contain a very full resume of the best which have been written on the subjects embraced under the medical applications of electricity in its various modes of development, and a careful analysis of the doctrines of others; while the author has given frankly an account of cases in which he has failed, as of those in which he has been successful. He does not offer electric treatment as a panacea for "all the ills which flesh is heir to," but shows how far and in what cases it proves beneficial. He has shown that there is a right and a wrong way of operating, and that mischief may be done by an unskilful hand, while one who is well qualified by scientific knowledge and practical experience may do much good, and in many diseases,—more especially in those of the nerves, such as neuralgia and partial paralysis, in which remarkable cures have been effected. We commend this work to the attention of medical gentlemen, and especially to students of medicine who wish to be posted up in the novel methods of treating diseases. It is also a book which all scientific men may consult with advantage, and which will gratify the curiosity of the general scholar.

Memoir of Edward Forbes, F.R.S., Late Regius Professor of Natural History in the University of Edinburgh. By GEORGE WILSON, M.D., F.R.S.E., and ARCHIBALD GEIKIE, F.R.S.E., etc. Cambridge and London: MacMillan & Co.

Dr. Wilson did not live to finish the memoir which he so ably began. The great naturalist, Edward Forbes, deserved the best from his contemporaries, and we are glad to have the combined labors of such distinguished men as Wilson and Geikie put forth in commemoration of him. The chair of Natural History at Edinburgh was honored by him whose biography is now before us. His advent to that eminent post was everywhere hailed with a unanimity that augured well for his career, and no one could have been chosen to succeed the illustrious Jameson for whom there could have been more enthusiasm. His admitted genius and the range of his acquirements fully entitled him to the office, and all who know him looked forward to brilliant accomplishments in his varied paths of science. Death closed the brief years of this earnest student at the early age of thirty-nine. Cut off in the prime of his days, with his powers and purposes but partially unfolded, he yet shows grandly among the best men of his time.



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