Alas! that the contemplation of so worthy a theme is marred by the 'ifs' and 'buts' of controversial strife. Alas! that we cannot depress the sectional opposing interests which are but secondary to a condition of political consolidation, and elevate above these distracting and isolated evils, the great and eternal principle, Strength as it alone exists in Unity. Alas! that with the beam of suicidal measures we blind the eye political, because, forsooth, the motes of individual or local injuries afflict, as they afflict all human forms of government.

The great evil, North and South, before the war, during the war, and now, is the want of political charity—that charity which, like its moral prototype, 'suffereth long and is kind.' We the people, North and South, have been and are unwilling to grant to the other people and States the right to think, speak, and urge their own opinions—the very right which each insists upon claiming for itself. It has been held 'dangerous' to discuss questions which, though in one sense pertaining only to particular States, nevertheless bear upon the whole country. It has been considered 'heresy' to urge with rhetoric and declamation, even in our halls of Congress, certain principles for and against Slavery, for example, lest mischief result from the agitation of those topics. But in such remonstrance we have forgotten that the very principle of democratic institutions involves the right of all men to think and act, under the law, as each pleases. We have also forgotten that any subject which will not bear discussion and political consideration must be dangerous in itself, and pregnant with weakness, if not evil. There is no harm in discussing questions upon which hang vital principles; for if there exists on the one side strength and justice, all arguments on the other side can do it no injury. With regard to Slavery, one of the 'causes' or 'occasions' of this unhappy war, it may be said that the North owes much to the South which it has never paid, in a true and kindly appreciation of the difficulties which have ever surrounded the institutions of the latter. But let us not forget that one reason why this debt has not been paid is because the South owes the North its value received, by not being willing to admit in the other's behalf the motives which underlay the efforts which have been made by the earnest, or so-called 'radical' men, who have opposed the institution of slavery. Pure misunderstanding of motive, pure lack of political as well as moral charity, has been wanting between the men of the North who opposed, and the men of the South who maintained the extension of slavery. Had each understood the other better, it is probable that the character of each would have assumed the following proportions: The slaveholder of the South, inheriting from generations back a system of servitude which even ancient history supported and defended, and which he in his inmost heart believes to be beneficial to the slave not less than the master, regards himself as violating no law of God or man in receiving from this inferior race or grade of men the labor of their hands, and the right to their control, while they draw from him the necessary physical support and protection which it is in his belief his bounden duty to give. The planter, a gentleman educated and a Christian, with the fear of God before his eyes, believes this—the belief was born in him and dies in him, and he is conscientiously faithful in carrying out the principles of his faith. I speak now of no exceptional, but of general cases, instancing only the representative of the highest class of Southern men. Is it to be wondered at that such a man, looking from his point of vision, should regard with suspicion and distrust the efforts of those who sought to abolish even by gradual means the apparent sources of his prosperity? Is it remarkable that he should regard as his enemy the man who preaches against and denounces as criminal the very system in which he trusts his social and political safety? He will not regard that apparent enemy what at heart and soul he really is, namely, a man as pure and devout, as well meaning and conscientious as himself. The man whom he scoffs at as a 'radical,' an 'abolitionist,' and a 'fanatic,' by education and intuition believes in his very soul that the holding of men in bondage, forcing from them involuntary labor, and the consequences thereof, are pregnant with moral and political ruin and decay. The system, not the men, is offensive to his eyes. Is he to blame for this opinion, provided it be well founded in his mind? Admit it eroneous in logic, still, if he believes it, is he to be condemned for holding the belief, and would he not be contemptible in his own eyes if he feared to express the moral convictions of his soul? The error of both has been that both are uncharitable—both unwilling to allow the right of opinion and freedom of debate on what both, as American citizens, hold to be vital principles, dependent upon constitutional provisions; the one claiming Slavery as the 'corner stone of political freedom,' the other as the stumbling block in the way of its advancement. This unwillingness to appreciate the motives of opposing minds led at last one section of our beloved country to an unwillingness to recognize the right of election, and, worse than all, an unwillingness to abide by the results of that election. When that principle—submission to the will of the majority—was overthrown, then, indeed, did the pillars of our national temple tremble, and the seat of our national power rock in its foundation.

And now a word in connection with this same principle of submission, as applicable to the people of the North in our present emergency. In accordance with the plan adopted by the founders of our Government, and practically illustrated in the election of George Washington and his successors, the people by a plurality of votes elected to office and placed at the head of our political system as its highest authority and ruler, the present Chief Magistrate. From the day of his acknowledged election, party politics settled into the calm of acquiescence, and all loyal and true States and men bowed to the arbitrament of the ballot box. That man, Abraham Lincoln, instantly became invested with the potential right of rule under the Constitution, and the great principle of constitutional liberty in his election and elevation stood justified. It mattered not then, nor matters it now, to us, what may be individual opinion of his merits or demerits, his ability or his disability. There he is, not as a private citizen, but as the head of our Government: his individuality is lost in his official embodiment. This principle being acknowledged, and party opinion being buried, in theory at least, at the foot of the altar of the Government de facto, whence is it that at this time creeps into our council chambers, our political cliques, our social haunts, our market places, ay, our most sacred tabernacles—a spirit adverse to the principles for which we are fighting, laboring for, and dying for? Let us—a people anxious for peace on honorable grounds, anxious for a Union which no rash hand shall ever again attempt to destroy—look, with a moment's calm reflection, at this alarming evil.

It is very evident to most men that, in spite of temporary defeats and an unexpected prolongation of the war, the loyal States hold unquestionably the preponderance of power. Nothing but armed intervention from abroad can now affect even temporarily this preponderance. As events and purposes are seen more clearly through the smoke of the battle fields by the ever-watchful eyes of Europe, armed intervention becomes less and less a matter of probability. The hopes of an honorable peace, therefore, hang upon the increase and continuance of this military preponderance. With the spirit of determination evinced by both combatants, the unflinching valor of both armies, and with the unquestioned resources and ability to hold out of the North, it appears evident that the strife for mastery will in time terminate in favor of the loyal States. There is but one undermining influence which can defeat this end, and still further prolong the war, or, what is worse, plunge the North into the irretrievable disaster of internal conflict—and that undermining influence is dissension among ourselves. Such a consummation would bring joy to the hearts of our enemies and lend them the first ray of real hope that ultimate separation will be their purchased peace. We will not here draw a picture of that fallacious peace, that suicidal gap, whose festering political sore would breed misery and ruin, not only for ourselves, but for our posterity, for ages to come. But let us be warned in time. Even now the insidious movement of dissension is hailed with satisfaction and delight in the council meetings at Richmond, and no effort will be spared to aid its devastating progress. False rumors will be raised on the slightest and most insignificant grounds. Trivial mistakes and blunders in the cabinet and the field will be magnified; facts distorted, and the flame be blown by corrupting influences abroad and at home, in the hopes—let them be vain hopes—that we the people will be diverted from the great cause we have most at heart into side issues and sectional distrust. And why? Because more powerful than serried hosts and open warfare is the poison of sedition and conspiracy that is thrown into the cup of domestic peace and confidence—more fatal than the ravages of the battle field is that of the worm that creeps slowly and surely—weakening, as it works, the foundations of the edifice in which we dwell unsuspicious of evil. Is it astonishing that they, the enemies of our common weal, should rejoice in these signs of incipient weakness, or fail to resort to any expedient whereby our strength as a united and loyal people can be made less? Have they not shown themselves capable and ready to avail themselves of every weakness in our counsels and in the field? Would not we do the same did we perceive distrust and dissatisfaction presenting through the mailed armor of our opponents a vulnerable point for attack? Then blame them not with muttered imprecations, but look—ay, look to ourselves. The shape of this undermining influence is political dissension at a period when the name of 'party' ought to be obliterated from the people's creed. Let opinion on measures and men have full and unrestricted sway, so far as these opinions may silently work under the banner of the one great cause of self-preservation; but let them not interfere with the prosecution of the efforts of the Government, whether State or national, to prosecute this holy and patriotic war in defence of the principles which created and are to keep us a united nation. Let us not tempt the strength of the ice that covers the waters of political and partisan problems, while we have enough to do to protect and cover the solid ground already in our possession. The President of the United States, be he who or what he may—think he how or what he will, enact he what he chooses—is, let us remember, the corner stone of our political liberty. The Constitution is a piece of parchment—sacred and to be revered—but it is, in its outward presentment, material and inactive. The spirit of the Constitution is intangible and ideal, its interpretation alone is its vitality. We the people—through equally material morsels of paper entitled votes—raise the spirit of the Constitution by placing in the halls of Congress the interpreters of that Constitution, over whom and above all sits the Chief Magistrate, who, once endowed by us with power, retains and sways it until another, by the same process, carries out at our will the same eventualities. Our part as electors and adjudicators is done, and it ill becomes us to weaken or hold up to the ridicule of the world the power therein invested, by questions as to the President's 'right' or 'power' or 'ability' to enact this measure or that.

Away then with the unseemly cry of 'the Constitution as it is,' 'the Union at it was,' the 'expediency' or 'non-expediency' of employing the war power, the interference or the non-interference of the man and the men established by us to represent us with the military leaders, the finances, or the thousand and one implements of administration, which they are bound to employ, not as we, but as they, holding our powers of attorney for a specified and legalized period, in their human wisdom deem best for the common good of the land. Let us have faith in the motives and intentions of our political administration, or if we have lost our faith, let us submit—patiently and with accord. Above all, at a period like this, when the minds of the best men and the truest are oppressed with a sense of the injustice with which a portion of our countrymen regard us, it most behooves us to keep our social and political ranks closed and in order, subject to the will of that commander, disobedience to which is infamy and ruin. No matter with what diversity of tongues and opinions we pursue our individual avocations and aims, we are all pilgrims pressing forward like the followers of Mohammed to the Kebla stone of our faith—Peace founded on Union.

What if a party clique utters sentiments adverse to our own on the never ceasing topic of political policy? Is it not the expression of a mind or a hundred minds forming a portion of the great body politic, of which we ourselves are a part, and are they not entitled to their opinion and modes of expressing it, providing it be done with decorum and with a proper respect for the opinions of their adversaries? Why then do we or they employ, through the press and in rhetorical bombast, opprobrious epithets, fit only for the pot-house or the shambles? Shall we men and citizens, each of us a pillar upholding the crowning dome of our nationality, be taught, like vexed and querulous children, the impotence of personal abuse? Why seek to lay upon the head of this Cabinet officer or that, this Senator or that, the responsibility of temporary military defeats, when we are no more able to command and prevent reverses than are they? Or if in our superior wisdom we deem ourselves to be the better able to direct and administer, why do we forget that others among us, inspired by the same love of country, and equally ardent for its safety and advancement, hold exactly contrary opinions? It is not a matter of opinion—it is not a matter for interference, it is simply and only a matter for untiring unflinching confidence and support. We have done our duty as a people, and elected our Administration—let us, in the name of all that is sublime and fundamental in republican principles, support and not perplex them in the hard and complex problem which they are appointed to solve. These are principles, which, however trite, need to be kept before us and practically sustained at a period when, as is often the case in long and tedious wars, the dispiriting influence of delays and occasional defeats work erroneous conclusions in the minds of the people, leading to unjust accusations against the men in power, and an unwillingness to frankly acknowledge that the evil too often originated where the result most immediately occurred. In other words, our armies have often suffered simply and for no other reason than that they were outgeneralled on the field of battle, or overpowered by military causes for which no one is to blame—least of all, the President or his advisers.

And here let one word be said against the arguments of those well-meaning and patriotic men who attempt to prove that certain acts of the Government have been injudicious and unwise—such, for example, as the suspension of the habeas corpus, the alleged illegal arrests, and the emancipation policy. It is not the purpose of this paper to enter into additional argument to sustain this opinion or to disprove it. But in justice to the Government—simply because it is a Government—let it not be forgotten that when events heretofore unforeseen and unprepared for are throwing our vast nation into incalculable confusion, and when it becomes absolutely imperative that the head of the Government must act decisively and according to the promptness of his honest judgment, and when we know equally well that that judgment, be it what it may, cannot accord with the various and diverse opinions of all men, then it behooves his countrymen, if not to acquiesce in, to support whatever that honest judgment may decide to be best for the emergency. No doubt, errors have been made, but they are errors inconceivably less in their results than would be the unpardonable sin of the people, should they, because differing in opinion, weaken the hands and confuse the purposes of the powers that be. With secret and treacherous foes in our very midst, hidden behind the masks of a painted loyalty, the President, after deep and earnest consultation and reflection, deemed it his duty to authorize arrests under circumstances which he solemnly believed were the best adapted to arrest the evil, though, by so doing, many good and innocent men might temporarily suffer with the bad. So too with regard to the proclamation of freedom—be the step wise or unwise, and there is by no means a unity of sentiment on this head—the President conceived it to be the duty of his office—a duty which never entered into his plans or intentions until the war had increased to gigantic and threatening proportions—to level a blow at what he and millions of his countrymen believe to be the stronghold of the enemy, viz., that system of human servitude which nourished the body politic and social now standing in armed and fearful resistance to the Constitution and the laws. It matters not, so far as opinion goes, whether the step was wise or foolish, if the executive head deemed it wise. Nor was it a hasty or spasmodic movement on his part. Months were devoted to its consideration, and every argument was patiently and candidly listened to from all the representatives of political theory for and against. Even then no hasty step was taken; but, on the contrary, our deluded countrymen in arms against us were forewarned, and earnestly, respectfully advised and entreated to take that step in behalf of Union and peace, which would leave their institution as it had existed. Nay, more: terms whereby no personal inconvenience or pecuniary loss to them would be involved if they would but be simply loyal to the Government, were liberally offered them, with three months for their consideration. Let those of us who, notwithstanding these ameliorating circumstances, doubt the good policy of the act, remember that they of the South, our open foes, invited the measures. Their leaders acknowledged and their press boasted that the Southern army never could be overcome—if for no other reason, for this reason, that while the army of the North was composed of the bone and muscle of the great working classes, drawn away from the fields of labor and enterprise, which must necessarily, in their opinion, languish from this absence, the Confederate army was composed of 'citizens' and property owners (to wit, slaveholders), whose absence from their plantations in no way interfered with the growth of their cotton, sugar, corn, and rice, from which sources of wealth and nourishment they could continue to draw the sinews of war. They went farther than this, and acted upon their declaration by employing their surplus slave labor in the work of intrenching their fortifications, serving their army, and finally fighting in their army.

Upon this basis of slave labor they asserted their omnipotence in war and ability to continue the struggle without limit of time. The subsidized press of England supported this theory, and declared that with such advantages it was idle for the Federal Government to maintain a struggle in the face of such belligerent advantages! Then, and not till then, were the eyes of the President open to a fact which none but the political blind man could fail to observe, and then it was that not only the President, but a very large proportion of our countrymen, heretofore strictly conservative men, felt that the time had come when further forbearance would be suicidal. Although many doubted and still doubt if slavery was the cause of the rebellion, very many were forced to the conclusion that what our enemies themselves admitted to be the strength of the rebellion was indeed such, and that the time had arrived to avail themselves of that military necessity which authorizes the Government to adopt such measures as may be deemed the most fitting for crushing rebellion and restoring our constitutional liberty. Let us think, then, as we please upon the judiciousness of the proclamation—that it was uttered with forethought, calmness, and with a full sense of the responsibility of the President to his God and his country, none of us can deny. With this we should be satisfied. We have but one duty before us, then, as a government and a people—and that is, an earnest, devoted prosecution of this war for the integrity of our common country. In the untrammelled hands of that Government let us leave its prosecution. We have but one duty before us as individuals, and that is to support the existing Government with our individual might. Let the cry be loud and long, as, thank Heaven, it still is, 'On with the war,' not for war's sake, but for the sake of that peace, which only war, humanely and vigorously conducted, can achieve.

Fling personal ambition and individual aggrandizement to the winds. Let political preferment and partisan proclivities bide their time, and as a united and one-minded people, devote heart and mind, strength and money, to the prosecution of the campaign, without considering what may be its duration, and without fear of circumstance or expenditure. If it be necessary, let the public debt be increased until it reaches and exceeds the public liabilities of the most indebted Government of Europe. We and our descendants will cheerfully pay the interest on that expenditure which purchased so great a blessing as national endurability. Meanwhile, with unity, forbearance, perseverance, and the silent administration of the ballot box, we will, as a people, maintain, notwithstanding that a portion of the land we hold dear stands severed from us by hatred and prejudice, the prosperity which we still claim, and the renown which was once accorded to us. By so doing, and by so doing only, shall our former grandeur come back to us—though its garments be stained with blood. A grandeur which, without hyperbole, it may be said, will outstrip the glory which, as a young and sanguine people, we have ever claimed for our country. The reason for so believing is the simple and undeniable fact that out of the saddening humiliation and devastation of this civil war has arisen the better knowledge of the wonderful resources, abilities, and determined spirit of the American people. We see—both combatants—that we are giants fighting, and not quarrelling pigmies, as the foreign enemies of us both have vainly attempted to prove. We see, both combatants, how vast and important to each is the territory we are struggling for, how inseparable to our united interests are the sources of wealth imbedded in our rocks, underlying our soil, and growing in its beneficent bosom. We see, both combatants, how strong is the commerce of the East to supply, like a diligent handmaiden, the wants of every section; how bountiful are the plantations of the South and the granaries of the West to keep the world united to us in the strong bonds of commercial and friendly intercourse; how absolutely necessary to the prosperity of both are the deep and wide-flowing rivers which run, like silver bands of peace, through the length and breadth of a land whose vast privileges we have been too blind to appreciate, and in that blindness would destroy. Above all, we are beginning to see that like two mighty champions fighting for the belt of superiority, we can neither of us achieve that individual advantage which can utterly and forever place the other beyond the ability of again accepting the gauntlet of defiance, and that our true and lasting glory can alone proceed from a determination to shake hands in peace, and, as united champions, defying no longer each other, defy the world. Nor would the South in consenting to a reunion now find humiliation or dishonor. She has proved herself a noble foe—quick in expedient, firm in determination, valorous in war. We know each other the better for the contest; we shall, when peace returns, respect each other the more; and although the cost of that peace, whenever it comes, will be the sacrifice of many local prejudices and sectional privileges, what, oh, what are such sacrifices to the inestimable blessings of national salvation?



THE COMPLAINING BORE.

About the most disagreeable people one meets with in life are those who make a business of complaining. They ask for sympathy when they merit censure. There is no excuse for man or woman making known their private griefs except to intimate friends or those who stand in the nearest relation to them. I have no patience with the man who wishes to catch the public ear with the sound of his repining. Be it that he complain of the world generally, or specify the particular occasion of his dumpishness, he is in either aspect equally contemptible. What a serio-comic spectacle a man presents who imagines that everybody is in a leagued conspiracy against him to disappoint his hopes and thwart his plans for success! He thinks he is kept from rising by some untoward fate that is bent on crushing him into the ground, feels that he is the victim of persecution, the sport of angry gods. Not having the spirit of a martyr, he frets and fumes about his condition, and finds a selfish relief in counting over his grievances in the presence of all who are good-natured enough to listen. Such a fellow is a social nuisance—away with him! The fact usually is that the world has more reason to complain of him than he of the world. For instance, I know a man who has become misanthropic, but who should hate himself instead of the whole race.

Mr. Jordan Algrieve has become disgusted with life, and confesses than his experiment with existence has thus far proved a failure. He has combated with the world, and the world has proved too much for him, and he acknowledges the defeat. Mr. Algrieve is on the shady side of fifty, and his hair getting to be of an iron gray. His features are prominent, with a face wrinkled and shrivelled by discontent and acidity of temper. His tall figure is bent, not so much by cares and weight of years, as in a kind of typical submission to the stern decree of an evil destiny.

Strange to say, he is well educated, and graduated with honor at one of our Eastern colleges. With a knowledge of this fact, it is pitiable to see him standing at the corner of the street in his busy town in a suit of seedy black and a shockingly bad hat, chafing his hands together and pretending to wait for somebody who never comes.

Poor Algrieve, he is a man under the table, and he knows it. He has tried to be somebody in his way, but has failed sadly in all his efforts. It is said that Algrieve always had a constitutional aversion to legitimate and continued labor, but has a passion for making strikes and securing positions that afford liberal pay for little work.

Thinking a profession too monotonous and plodding, he never took the trouble to acquire one. As to honest manual toil, that was an expedient he never so much as dreamed of. In early life he was so unfortunate as to secure an appointment to a clerkship in the Assembly, and after that he haunted the State Legislature for five or six winters in hot pursuit of another place, but his claims failing to be recognized, he relapsed into the natural belief that his party was in league to proscribe him. After making a large number of political ventures of a more ambitious order, and with the same mortifying results, he abandoned that field and took to speculation in patent rights. He vended a wonderful churn-dash, circulated a marvellous flatiron, and expatiated through the country on the latest improvement in the line of a washing machine. But these operations somehow afforded him but transient relief, and left him always involved still more largely in debt. At different times in his life he had also been a horse dealer, a dry-goods merchant, a saloon keeper, the proprietor of a tenpin alley, and managed to grow poorer in all these various occupations. The last I saw of him he was reduced to peddling books in a small way, carrying his whole stock in a new market basket. He was very importunate in his appeals to customers to purchase, putting it upon the ground that he had been unfortunate and had a claim to their charity. I happened to see him in the office of the popular hotel in Podgeville, when he was more than usually clamorous for patronage. He accosted nearly every man in the room with a dull, uninteresting volume in his hand, and for which he asked a respectable price. At last he set down his basket, and commenced a kind of snivelling harangue to his little audience. Mr. Algrieve opened by saying:

'Gentlemen, you'll pardon me for thrusting myself upon your attention; but it is hard to have the world turned against ye, and to work like a slave all your life to get something to fall back on in old age, and then have to die poor at last! I hope none of you have ever known what it is to be born unlucky; to never undertake anything but turned out a failure, and to meet disappointment where you deserved success. I am such a man!'

Here Mr. Algrieve produced a fragmentary pocket handkerchief for the ostensible purpose of absorbing an expected tear, but really to give his remark a tragic effect. He continued:

'Behold an individual who has been doomed to penury and destitution, but who has not met his fate without a struggle. You who have known me, gentlemen, for the last thirty years, know that Jordan Algrieve has battled with life manfully.' At this point he put out his clenched fist in defiance of his fancied enemy.' But I have been compelled to yield to the force of circumstances—not, however, till I had taken my chance in nearly every department of honorary endeavor, and experienced the most wretched success. The world has pronounced its ban upon me, and I must bow submissively to its cruel imposition. I tried to serve my country in the capacity of a public official, but my services and talents were repeatedly rejected—the majority of voters always so necessary to an honest election was forever on the side of my lucky opponent. When I withdrew from the political field, impoverished by my efforts to advance the prosperity of my party, I embarked in a small commercial enterprise; but owing to the tightness of the times, and my want of capital, I was soon obliged to give up and throw myself upon the mercy of my creditors. I have tried popular amusements, and lost money—that is, I failed to make it. I even branched out into fancy speculations, but they only served to sink me still deeper in the yawning depths of insolvency!'

Mr. Algrieve here paused, and seemed to look down into the frightful gulf with a shuddering expression, as if he were not quite accustomed to the descent yet.

'In short, gentlemen, I am completely prostrated—I am floored! And is the world willing to help me up? By no means! On the contrary, when I commenced falling and slipping on the stairs of human endeavor the world was ready to kick me down, down, till I reached the—in short, gentlemen, till I became what I now am. Now, what have I done, let me ask, that I should fare thus? Have I not made an effort? I appeal to you, gentlemen, to say. [A voice from the crowd here chimed in: 'Yes, Algrieve, your efforts to live without work have been immense!'] But here I am, poor and persecuted; my family are in want of some of the common necessaries of life; and now, gentlemen, I beg some of you will buy that book (holding out a copy of the 'Pilgrim's Progress'), and do something to avert for a while, at least, the pauper's fate!'

Some benevolent gentleman, either from a charitable motive, or to put an end to his lachrymose oration, bought the volume for $1.25. Mr. Algrieve received the money with many expressions of gratitude, and, gathering up his stock, moped off into the drinking room, and invested a dime in a gin cocktail, and five cents in a cigar, with which he sought to solace himself for all the inflictions of the inexorable world.

Thus Jordan Algrieve goes about telling of his reverses and misfortunes, exhibiting them to the public eye like a beggar his sores, without shame or remorse; seeking to levy contributions on his fellow men, as one who has been robbed of his estate. Reader, will you say that you have never met with Jordan Algrieve?

Another common species of the complaining bore are those who are continually parading their bodily infirmities. For example, a man will call on you, apparently for the express purpose of illustrating a most interesting case of neuralgia. He comes into your office, perhaps, with his head tied up in a handkerchief, and an expression of face as if he had some time winked one eye very close, and had never since been able to open it. Thinking himself an object worthy of study, he shows how the darting pains vacillate between his eyes, invade his teeth, hold general muster in his cheeks, take refuge in the back of his neck; and demonstrates these points to you by applying his hands to the parts designated, and uttering cries of feigned anguish to give effect to his description. He informs you, as a piece of refreshing intelligence, that it is devilish hard to bear, and enough to make a saint indulge in profanity. When he has proceeded thus far, he may be taken with one of his capricious pains, ducks his head between his knees, squeezes it with his hands, and bawls out: 'O-h! Je-ru-sa-lem!' with a duration of sound only limited by the capacity of his wind. He feels that he has a witness to his sufferings, and wishes to make the most of it. When he gets sufficiently easy, he tells you his experience with various remedies, enumerates all the lotions, liniments, ointments, and other applications he has used, with his opinion on the merits of each.

Another person will accost you on a bright day with a most saturnine and wo-begone visage, informing you that he is in a terrible way, that his food distresses him, and he can't any longer take comfort in eating. He places his hand in the region of his stomach, remarks that he feels a great load there, and makes the usual complaints of a dyspeptic. He is pathetic over the fact that his physician has denied him fried oysters and mince pie for evening lunch, and closes his observations by exclaiming in a moralizing vein that 'such is life!'

A third individual has a throat disease, and, forgetful of his bad breath, desires you to take a minute survey of his glottis, and inform him of its appearance. Accordingly he opens his mouth and throws back his head as if he were inviting you to an entertaining show.

These are but a tithe of the examples of people who exhibit in public and at social gatherings their ills and ailments, accompanied with dreary complainings of their bodily inflictions. It implies no indifference or lack of sympathy for physical pain and hardships to say that its victims have no right to mar the enjoyment of others by the unnecessary display of their infirmities or present sufferings. If a man will make a travelling show of his disorders, he should be obliged to carry a hand organ to give variety to his stupid entertainment. Were these fellows all compelled to furnish this accompaniment, what a musical bedlam our streets would become! Of course, there is no law against complaining and repining—it may not be immoral—but it is a very poor method of making those around us happy, which is a duty that none but selfish natures can forget. A man who goes through life with a smiling face and cheerful temper, despite the grievances common to us all, is a public benefactor in his way, as much as one who founds a library or establishes an asylum.

Misanthropy is a sublime egotism that mistakes its own distemper for a disease of the universe. With all the mishaps to which our life is subject, a glance over a wide range of human experience proves that God helps those who help themselves, and whatever be the tenor of our fortune, levity is more seemly than moodiness, and under any circumstances there is more virtue in being a clown than a cynic. But in adversity, a subdued cheerfulness and quiet humor are, next to Christian fortitude, the golden mean of feeling that makes the loss of worldly things rest lightly on the heart, and spreads out before the hopeful eye the vision of better days!



DEATH OF THE BRAVE.

'How sleep the brave who sink to rest By all their country's wishes blest! When spring with dewy fingers cold Returns to deck their hallowed mould, She then shall dress a sweeter sod Than fancy's feet have ever trod.'



LITERARY NOTICES

THE ICE MAIDEN, AND OTHER TALES. By HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN. Translated by FANNY FULLER. Philadelphia: F. Leypoldt. New York: C. T. EVANS. 1863.

Probably no writer of stories for the young ever equalled Hans Christian Andersen; certainly none ever succeeded as he has done in reproducing the nameless charm of the real fairy tale which springs up without an author among the people,—the best specimens of which are the stories collected by the Brothers Grimm in Germany. But this exquisite fascination of an inner life in animals and in inanimate objects, which every child's mind produces from dolls and other puppets, and which makes fairies of flowers, is by Andersen adroitly turned very often to good moral and instructive purpose, without losing the original sweet and simple charm which blends the real and the imaginary. Here he surpasses all other tale writers, nearly all of whom, in their efforts at simplicity in such narratives, generally become supremely silly.

The present volume contains four stories—'The Ice Maiden,' 'The Butterfly,' 'The Psyche,' and 'The Snail and the Rose Tree,'—all in Andersen's usual happy and successful vein; for he is preeminently an equal writer, and never falls behind himself. Perhaps the highest compliment which can be paid them is the truthful assertion that any person may read them with keen interest, and never reflect that they were written for young people. Poetry and prose meet in them on equal grounds, and any of them in verse would be charming. The main reason for this is that such stories to charm must set forth natural objects with Irving-like fidelity; nay, the writer must, with a few words, bring before us scenes and things as in a mirror. In this 'The Ice Maiden' excels; Swiss life is depicted as though we were listening to yodle songs on the mountains, and felt the superstitions of the icy winter nights taking hold of our souls.

'The Psyche' is an art-story. Most writers would have made it a legend of 'high' art, but it is far sweeter and more impressive from the sad simplicity and gentleness with which it is here told. 'The Butterfly,' on the contrary, is a delightful little burlesque on flirtations and fops; and 'The Snail and the Rose Tree' is much like it. Both are really fables of the highest order, or shrewd prose epigrams.

The volume before us is well translated; very well, notwithstanding one or two trifling inadvertencies, which, however, really testify to the fact that the best of all pens for such version—a lady's—was employed in the work. A Skytte, for instance, in Danish, or Schutz in German, is generally termed among the fraternity of sportsmen a 'shot,' and not a 'shooter.' But the spirit of the original is charmingly preserved, and Miss Fuller has the rare gift of using short and simple words, which are the best in the world when one knows how to use them as she does. We trust that we shall see many more stories of this kind, translated by her.

We must, in conclusion, say a word for the dainty binding (Pawson & Nicholson), the exquisite paper and typography, and, finally, for the pretty photograph vignette with which this volume is adorned. Mr. Leypoldt has benefited Philadelphia in many ways,—by his foreign and American circulating library, his lecture room, and by his republication in photograph of first-class engravings,—and we now welcome him to the society of publishers. His first step in this direction is a most promising one.

NOTES, CRITICISMS, AND CORRESPONDENCE UPON SHAKSPEARE'S PLAYS AND ACTORS. By JAMES HENRY HACKETT. New York: Carleton, 413 Broadway. 1863.

This work will be one of great interest, firstly to all those who visit the theatre, secondly to readers of Shakspeare, and thirdly to all who relish originality and naivete of character, such as Mr. Hackett displays abundantly, from the rising of the curtain even to the going down of the same, in his book. There are no men who live so much within their profession as actors, or are so earnest in their faith in it; and this devotion is reflected unconsciously, but very entertainingly, through the whole volume. Shakspeare tells us that all the world is a stage—to the actor the stage is all his world, the only one in which he truly lives.

We thank Mr. Hackett for giving us in this volume, firstly, very minute and excellent descriptions of all the eminent actors of Shakespeare within his memory—not a brief one, he having been himself a really excellent and eminent actor since 1828. It is to be regretted that there are not more such judicious descriptions as these. The author has, as we gather from his book, been in the habit of recording his daily experiences, and consequently writes from better data than those afforded by mere memory. The reader will also thank him for many agreeable minor reminiscences of celebrities, and for giving to the public his extremely interesting correspondence on Shaksperean subjects with John Quincy Adams and others. The views of the venerable statesman on Hamlet, and on 'Misconceptions of Shakspeare on the Stage,' indicate a very great degree of study of the great poet, and of reflection on the manner in which he is over or under acted. Nor are Mr. Hackett's own letters and criticisms by any means devoid of merit—witness the following:

'Mr. Forrest recites the text (of King Lear) as though it were all prose, and not occasionally written in poetic measure; whereas, blank verse can, and always should, be distinguishable from prose by proper modulations of the voice, which a listener with a nice ear and a cultivated taste could not mistake, nor, if confounded, detect in their respective recitals: else Milton as well as Shakspeare has toiled to little purpose in the best-proportioned numbers.'

The criticism on Forrest is throughout judicious, and, though frequently severe, is still very kindly written when we consider the 'capacities' of the subject.

As regards Mr. Hackett's views of readings, we detect in them a little of that tendency to excessive accentuation, and that disposition to 'make a hit' or a sensation in every sentence which renders most, or all, Shaksperean or tragic acting so harsh and strained, and which has made the word 'theatrical' in ordinary conversation synonymous with 'unnatural.' Something of this is reflected in the enormous amount of needless italicizing with which the typography of the book is afflicted, and which we trust will be amended in future editions. We cheerfully pardon Mr. Hackett for sounding his own praises—sometimes rather loudly and frequently, as in the republication of a sketch of himself—since, after all, we thereby gain a more accurate idea of a favorite actor, who has for thirty-six years pleased the public, and gained in that long time the character of a conscientious artist who has always striven to improve himself.

To one thing, however, we decidedly object—the questionable taste displayed by the author in answering in type criticisms of his acting, and in republishing them in his work. We can well imagine the temptation to be great, but to yield to it is not creditable to a good artist. With this little exception, we cordially commend the work to all readers.

DEVOTIONAL POEMS. By R. T. CONRAD. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co. 1862.

The late Judge Conrad left a number of religious poems, which fortunately fell into the hands of those who appreciated their merit, and we now have them in volume, with an introductory poem to the widow of the deceased and a preface by George H. Boker, to whom the editing of the present volume was committed. These lyrics, as we infer, were written in the spirit of private devotion, and are therefore gifted with the greatest merit which can possibly inspire religious writing—we mean deep sincerity. But apart from the spirit,—the sine qua non,—the beauty of the form of these works will always give them a high value to the impartial critic. They are far above the mediocrity into which most religious writers always at first appear to be lost, owing to the vast amount of thoughts and expressions which they are compelled to share in common with others. And as there has been awakened within a few years a spirit of collecting and studying such poetry, we cordially commend this work to all who share it.

As regards form, one of the more marked poems in this collection is 'The Stricken;' we have room only for the beginning:

Heavy! Heavy! Oh, my heart Seems a cavern deep and drear, From whose dark recesses start, Flatteringly like birds of night, Throes of passion, thoughts of fear, Screaming in their flight. Wildly o'er the gloom they sweep, Spreading a horror dim,—a woe that cannot weep!

Weary! Weary! What is life But a spectre-crowded tomb? Startled with unearthly strife, Spirits fierce in conflict met, In the lightning and the gloom, The agony and sweat; Passions wild and powers insane, And thoughts with vulture beak, and quick Promethean pain.

We select this single specimen from its remarkable resemblance to Anglo-Saxon religious poetry,—by far the sincerest, and, so far as it was ripened, the soundest, in our language. With the exception of the Promethean allusion, every line in these verses is singularly Saxon—the night birds, screaming in gloom—as in the 'Sea Farer,' where, instead of joyous mirth,

'Storms beat the stone cliffs, Where them the starling answered, Icy of wing.'

The divisions of this work are 'Sinai,' which is in great measure a commentary on virtues and vices, 'Sonnets on the Lord's Prayer,' and 'Bible Breathings.' Of these we would commend the Sonnets, as forming collectively a highly finished and beautiful poem, complete in each detail. The little poem, 'A Thought,' is as perfect as a mere simile in verse could be.

Robert T. Conrad, who was born in Philadelphia in 1810, and died there in 1858, first became known to the public by a drama entitled Conrad of Naples, a subject which has been extensively treated by German writers, Uhland himself having written a tragedy on it. After being admitted to the bar, Conrad connected himself with the press, but resumed the practice of law in 1834 with success, being appointed judge of the criminal sessions in 1838, and of the general sessions in 1840. He was subsequently president of a well-known railroad company, and mayor of his native city. During the intervals of his business he was at one time editor of Graham's Magazine, and acquired a literary reputation by his articles in the North American, and by the well-known tragedy of Aylmere, in which Mr. Forrest, the actor, has frequently appeared as 'Jack Cade.' In addition to these, Mr. Conrad published, in 1852, a volume entitled 'Aylmere and other poems,' which was very extensively reviewed. In it the 'Sonnets on the Lord's Prayer' first appeared.

The volume before us is very well edited in every respect, and makes its appearance in very beautiful 'externals.' The paper, binding, and typography are, in French phrase, as applied to such matters, 'luxurious.'

SKETCHES OF THE WAR: A Series of Letters to the North Moore Street School of New York. By CHARLES C. NOTT, Captain in the Fifth Iowa Cavalry. New York: Charles T. Evans, 448 Broadway. 1863.

Were this little work ten times its present length, we should have read it to the end with the same interest which its perusal inspired, and arrived, with the same regret that there was not more of it, at its last page. It is simple and unpretending, but as life-like and spirited as any collection of descriptive sketches which we can recall. We realize in it all the vexations of mud, all the horrors of blood, and all the joys of occasional chickens and a good night's rest, which render the soldier's life at once so great and yet so much a matter of petty joys and sorrows. The love of the rider for the good horse—for his pet Gypsy—her caprices and coquetries, are set forth, for instance, very freely, without, however, a shadow of affectation, while in all his interviews with men and women, the characters come before us 'like life,' and give us a singularly accurate conception of the social effects of the war in the West. The appearance of the country is unconsciously detailed as accurately as in a photograph, and the events and sensations of battle are presented with great ability; in fact, we have as yet seen no sketches from the war which in these particulars are equal to them. They are free from 'fine writing,' and are given in simple, intelligible language which cannot fail to make them generally popular. The occasional flashes of humorous description are extremely well given—so well that we only wish there had been more of them, as the author has evidently a talent in that direction, which we trust will be more fully developed in other works.



EDITOR'S TABLE

With all the outcry that has been raised at the slow progress of the war, it is difficult for a comprehensive mind to conceive how, on the whole, the struggle with the South could have advanced more favorably to the general interests and future prosperity of the whole country, than it has thus far done. 'Had the Administration been possessed of sufficient energy, it could have crushed the rebellion in the first month,' say the grumblers. Very possibly—to break out again! No amount of prompt action could have calmed the first fire and fury of the South. It required blood; it was starving for war; it was running over with hatred for the North.

The war went on, and, as it progressed, it became evident that, while thousands deprecated agitation of the slave question as untimely, the war could never end until that question was disposed of. And it also became every day more plain that the 'little arrangement' so frequently insisted on, and expressed in the words, 'Conquer the enemy first, and then free the slaves,' was a little absurdity. It was 'all very pretty,' but with the whole North and South at swords-points over this as the alleged cause of war—with all Europe declaring that the North had no intention of removing the cause of the war—with the slave constantly interfering in all our military movements—and, finally, with a party of domestic traitors springing up everywhere, at home and in the army itself, it became high time to adopt a fixed policy. It was adopted, and President LINCOLN, to his lasting honor, and despite tremendous opposition, issued the Proclamation of January First—the noblest document in history.

It is difficult to see how, when, or in what manner slavery would have disappeared from a single State, had the war been sooner ended; and nothing is more certain than that any early victory or temporary compromise would have simply postponed the struggle, to be settled with compound interest. But another benefit has resulted and is resulting from the experience of the past two years. Our own Free States have abounded with men who are at heart traitors; men who have, by their ignorance of the great principles of national welfare involved in this war, acted as a continual drawback on our progress. This body of men, incapable of comprehending the great principles of republicanism as laid down in the Constitution, and as urged by Washington, would be after all only partially vanquished should we subdue the rebels. They are around us here in our own homes; their treason rings from the halls of national legislation; they are busy night and day in their 'copperhead' councils in giving aid and comfort to the enemy, and in poisoning the minds of the ignorant, by hissing slanders at the President and his advisers as being devoid of energy and ability.

It would avail us little could we conclude a peace to-morrow, if these aiders and abetters of treason—these foes of all enlightened measures—these worse than open rebels—were to remain among us to destroy by their selfishness and malignity those great measures by which this country is destined to become great. The war is doing us the glorious service of bringing the 'copperheads' before the people in their true light—the light of foes to equality, to the rights of the many, and as perverse friends of all that is anti-American. Who and what, indeed, are their leaders! Review them all, from FERNANDO WOOD down to the wretched SAULSBURY, including W. B. REED, in whose veins hereditary traitorous blood seems, with every descent, to have acquired a fresh taint—consider the character which has for years attached to most of them—and then reflect on what a party must be with such leaders!

These men have no desire to be brought distinctly before the public; they would by far prefer to burrow in silence. But the war and emancipation have proved an Ithuriel's spear to touch the toad and make him spring up in his full and naturally fiendish form. The sooner and the more distinctly he is seen, the better will it be for the country. We must dispose of rebels abroad and copperheads at home ere we can have peace, and the sooner the country knows its foes, the better will it be for it. We have come at last to either carrying out the great centralizing system of an Union, superior to all States Rights, as commended by Washington, or to division into a thousand petty principalities, each ruled by its WOOD, or other demagogue, who can succeed in securing a majority-mob of adherents!

It is with such men and their measures that Gen. GEORGE B. MCCLELLAN, the frequently proposed candidate for the next presidency, is becoming firmly connected in the minds of the people! Fortunately the war has developed the objects of the traitors, and the Union Leagues which are springing up by hundreds over the country are doing good service in making them thoroughly known. Until treason is fairly rooted out at home and abroad, and until Union at the centre for the people everywhere is fully enforced, this war can only be concluded now, to be renewed in tenfold horror to-morrow.

* * * * *

There is a complication of interests at present springing up in Europe, which is difficult to fathom. Just now it seems as if the Polish insurrection were being fomented by Austria, at French instigation, in order that the hands of Russia may be tied, so that in case of war with America, we may be deprived of the aid of our great European friend. England sees it in this light, and angrily protests against Prussian interference in the matter. Should a general war result, who would gain by it? Would France avail herself of the opportunity to array her forces against Prussia, and seize the Rhine, and perhaps Belgium? Or would the Emperor avail himself of circumstances to embroil England in a war, and then withdraw to a position of profitable neutrality? Let it be borne in mind, meantime, that it required all the strength of France, England, and Austria, combined, to beat Russia in the Crimea, and that a short prolongation of the war would have witnessed the arrival of vast bodies of Russian troops—many of whom had been nearly a year on the march. Those troops are now far more accessible in case of war.

A war between England and the United States, however it might injure us, would be utter ruin to our adversary. With our commerce destroyed, we should still have a vast territory left; but nine tenths of England's prosperity lies within her wooden walls, which would be swept from the ocean. With her exportation destroyed, England would be ruined. We should suffer, unquestionably, but we could hold our own, and would undoubtedly progress as regards manufacturing. But what would become of the British workshops, and how would the British people endure such suffering as never yet befell them? Even with our Southern Rebellion on our hands, and English men-of-war on our coast, we could still, with our merchant marine, bring John Bull to his face. And John Bull knows it.

England is now building, in the cause of slavery and for the South, a great fleet of iron-clad pirate vessels, which are intended to prey on our commerce. How long will it be before retaliation on England begins, and, when it begins, how will it end? Ay—how will it end? It is not to be supposed that we can long be blinded by such a flimsy humbug as a transfer to Southern possession of these vessels 'for the Chinese trade!' Are the English mad, demented, or besotted, that they suppose we intend to endure such deliberate aid of our enemies? When those vessels 'for the Chinese' are afloat, and our merchants begin to suffer, let England beware! We are not a people to stop and reason nicely on legal points, when they are enforced in the form of fire and death. Better for England that she weighed the iron of that fleet pound for pound with gold, and cast it into the sea, than that she suffered it to be launched. Qui facit per alium, facit per se. England is the real criminal in this business, for her Government could have prevented it; and to her we shall look for the responsibility. All through America a spirit of fierce indignation has been awakened at hearing of this 'Chinese' fleet, which will burst out ere long in a storm. We are very far from being afraid of war—we are in it; we know what it is like—and those who openly, brazenly, infamously, aid our enemies and make war for them, shall also learn, let it cost what it may.

England hopes to cover the world's oceans with pirates, with murder, rapine, and robbery—to exaggerate still more the horrors of war—and yet deems that her commerce will escape! This is a different matter from the affair of the Trent.

* * * * *

Don't grumble! Don't be incessantly croaking from morning to night at the war and the administration and the generals, and everything else! Things have gone better on the whole than you imagine, and your endless growling is just what the traitors like. Were there no croakers there would be no traitors.

It was growling and croaking which caused the reverses of the army of the Potomac—sheer grumbling. Now the truth is coming out, and we are beginning to see the disadvantages of eternal fault-finding. The truth is that the war in the Crimea was much worse conducted than this of ours has been—even as regards swindling by contracts—and it was so with every other war. We have no monopoly of faults.

Now that the war is being reorganized, we would modestly suggest that a little severity—say an occasional halter—would not be out of place as regards deserters. There has been altogether too much of this amusement in vogue, which a few capital punishments in the beginning would have entirely obviated. Pennsylvania, we are told, is full of hulking runaway young farmers, and our cities abound in ex-rowdies, who, after securing their bounties, have deserted, and who are now aiding treason, and spreading 'verdigrease' in every direction by their falsehoods. Let every exertion be made to arrest and return these scamps—cost what it may; and let their punishment be exemplary. And let there be a new policy inaugurated with the new levy, which shall effectually prevent all further escaping.

* * * * *

Reader—wherever you are, either join a Union League, or get one up. If there be none in your town, gather a few friends together—and mind that they be good, loyal Unionists, without a suspicion of verdigrease or copperhead poison about them—and at once put yourselves in connection with the central Leagues of the great cities. Those of Philadelphia, New York and Boston are all conducted by honorable men of the highest character—and we may remark, by the way, that in this respect the contrast between the leaders of the League and of the Verdigrease Clubs is indeed remarkable. When you have formed your League, see that addresses are delivered there frequently, that patriotic documents and newspapers are collected there, and finally that it does good service in every way in forwarding the war, and in promoting the determination to preserve the Union.

The copperheads aim not only at letting the South go—they hope to break the North to fragments, and trust that in the general crash each of them may secure his share. When the war first broke out, FERNANDO WOOD publicly recommended the secession of New York as a free city—and a very free city it would have been under the rule of Fernando the First! And this object of 'dissolution and of division' is still cherished in secret among the true leaders of the traitors.

The time has come when every true American should go to work in earnest to strengthen the Union and destroy treason, whether in the field or at home. A foe to liberty and to human rights is a foe, whether he be a fellow countryman or not, and against such foes it is the duty of every good citizen to declare himself openly.

* * * * *

It will be seen by the annexed that our Art correspondent, a gentleman of wide experiences, has gone into the battle. We trust that his experiences will amuse the reader. As for the facts—never mind!

CAMP O'BELLOW, Army of the Potomac.

MY PATRIOTIC FRIEND AND EDITOR:

I have changed my base.

When I last wrote you, it was from the field of art—this time it is from the floor of my tent—at least it will be, as soon as my fellows pitch it. N. B.—For special information I would add that this is not done, as I have seen a Kalmouk do it, with a bucket of pitch and a rag on a stick. One way, however, of pitching tents is to pitch 'em down when the enemy is coming, and run like the juice. Ha, ha!

But I must not laugh too loudly, as yon small soldier may hear me. Little pitchers have long ears.

Now for my sufferings.

The first is my stove.

My stove is made of a camp kettle.

It has such a vile draught that I think of giving it a lesson in drawing. Joke. Perhaps you remember it of old in the jolly old Studio Building in Tenth Street. By the way how is WHITTREDGE?—I believe he imported that joke from Rome where he learned it of JULES DE MONTALANT who acquired it of CHAPMAN who got it from GIBSON, who learned it of THORWALDSEN who picked it up from DAVID who stole it from the elder VERNET to whom it had come down from MICHAEL ANGELO who cribbed it from ALBERT DUeRER who sucked it somehow from GIOTTO.

I wish you could see that stove. I cook in it and on it and all around the sides and underneath it. I wash my clothes in it, make punch in it, write on it, when cold sit on it, play poker on it, and occasionally use it for a trunk. It also gives music, for though it don't draw, it can sing.

My second friend is my Iron Bride—the sword. She is a useful creeter. Little did I think, when you, my beloved friends, presented me with that deadly brand, how useful she would prove in getting at the brandy, when I should have occasion to 'decap' a bottle. She kills pigs, cuts cheese, toasts pork, slices lemons, stirs coffee, licks the horses, scares Secesh, and cuts lead pencils. In a word, if I wished to give useful advice to a cavalry officer, it would be not to go to war without a sword.

A revolver is also extremely utilitarious. A large revolver, mind you, with six corks. Mine contains red and black pepper, salt, vinegar, oil, and ketchup—when I'm in a hurry. A curious circumstance once 'transpired,' as the missionaries say, in relation to this article of the quizzeen. All the barrels were loaded—which I had forgotten—and so proceeded to give it an extra charge of groceries. * * *

It was a deadly fray. Rang tang bang, paoufff! We fought as if it had been a Sixth Ward election. Suddingly I found myself amid a swarm of my country's foes. Sabres slashed at me, and in my rage I determined to exterminate something. Looking around from mere force of habit to see that there were no police about, I drew my revolver and aimed at JIM MARRYGOLD of Charleston, whom I had last seen owling it in New Orleans, four years ago. He and DICK MIDDLETONGUE of Natchez (who carved the Butcher's Daughter at Florence, and who is now a Secesh major), came down with their cheese knives, evidently intending to carve me. Such language you never heard, such a diluvium of profanity, such double-shotted d—ns! I drew my pistol at once, and gave Dick a blizzard. The ball went through his ear—the red pepper took his eyes, while Jim received the shot in his hat, and with it the sweet oil. In this sweet state of affairs, CHARLEY RUFFEM of Savannah was descending on me with his sabre. (He was the man who said my browns were all put in with guano.) I put him out of the way of criticism with a third barrel—killed him dead, and salted him.

The best of this war is, it enables me to exterminate so many bad artists.

The worst of it is that Charley owed me five dollars.

A fifth Secesh now made his appearance. We went it on the sword, and fought—for further particulars see Ivanhoe, volume second. My foe was RAWLEY CHIVERS, of Tuscumbia, Ala., and as the mischief would have it, he knew all my guards and cuts. We used to fence together, and had had more than one trial at 'fertig-los!' on the old Pauk-boden in Heidelberg.

'POP!' said he on the seventeenth round, 'are we going to chop all day?'

'CHIV,' said I, as I drew my castor, 'are you ready?'

'Ready,' quoth he, effecting the same manoeuvre—'one, two, three.'

I scratched his cheek, but the mustard settled him. Sputter—p'l'z'z'z—how he swore! I went at him with both hands.

'Priz?' I cried.

'Priz it is,' he answered.

So I took him off as a priz. He was very glad to go too, for he hadn't had a dinner for six weeks, and would have made a fine study for a Murillo beggar so ar as rags went.

I punish my men whenever I catch them foraging. Punish them by confiscation. Mild as I am by nature, I never allow them to keep stolen provisions—when I am hungry.

Yesterday evening I detected a vast German private with a colossal bull-turkey.

'Lay it down there, sir!' I exclaimed fiercely—indicating the floor of my tent as the bank of deposit.

'But den when I leafs it you eats de toorky up!' he exclaimed in sorrowful remonstrance.

'Yes,' I replied, like a Roman. 'Yes—I may eat it—but,' I added in tones of high moral conscientiousness, 'remember that I didn't STEAL it!'

He went forth abashed.

No more till it is eaten, from

Yours truly,

POPPY OYLE.

* * * * *

We are indebted to a Philadelphia correspondent for the following:

Alas! that noble thoughts so oft Are born to live but for an hour, Then sleep in slumber of the soul As droops at night the passion flower, Their morn is like a summer sun With splendor dawning on the day— Their eve beholds that glory gone, And light with splendor fled away.

J. W. L.

True indeed. The difference between the great mind and the small is after all that the former can retain its 'noble thoughts,' while with the latter they are evanescent. And it is the glory of Art that it revives such feelings, and keeps early impressions alive.

* * * * *

FROM THE GERMAN OF HEINE.

My love, in our light boat riding, We sat at the close of day; And still through the night went gliding, Afar on our watery way.

The Spirit Isle, soft glowing, Lay dimmering 'neath moon and star; There music was softly flowing, And cloud dances waved afar:

And ever more sweetly pealing, And waving more winningly; But past it our boat went stealing, All sad on the wide, wide sea.

* * * * *

Here is an

ADVENTURE WITH A GRIZZLY BEAR,

from a Philadelphia correspondent:

'We had gone out one morning, while camping upon the river San Joaquin, to indulge in the sport of fowling. There were three of us, and we possessed two skiffs, but an accident had reduced our sculls to a single pair, which my companion used to propel one of the boats down the stream, after securing the other, with me as its occupant, in the midst of a thicket of tule, where I awaited in ambush the flying flocks. As geese and ducks abounded, and nearly all of my shots told, in a few hours I had killed plenty of game; but becoming weary, as the intervals lengthened between the flights of the birds, I sat down, and had already begun to nod dozingly, when a startling splash, near the river bank, instantly aroused me. Grasping my gun and springing upright, I looked in the direction whence the sound had come; but, owing to the intervening mass of tule, could not see what kind of animal—for such I at once conjectured it must be—had occasioned my sudden surprise. Having hitherto seen no domestic stock hereabouts, I therefore felt fully satisfied that it could not belong to a tame species. Judging from the noise of its still continued movements, it was of no small bulk; and, if its ferocity were correspondent with its apparent size, this was indeed a beast to be dreaded.

'The thought at once occurred to me that, as I possessed neither oars nor other means of propulsion, it would be difficult to move the boat from its mooring if chance or acuteness of scent should lead the creature to my place of concealment. In short, this, with various suggestions of fancy, some of them ludicrously exaggerated, speedily made me apprehensive of imminent danger. Nor was my suspicion unfounded, for a crisis was at hand.

'There was a space of clear water between the river bank and the margin of the tule, in which the brute seemed to disport a few moments; and then the rustling of the reeds indicated that it was about to advance. With heavy footfalls it came toward me; as it approached my nervousness increased; I could not mistake that significant tread; undoubtedly it was a grizzly bear. But how could I escape? Bruin, though his progress was not unimpeded, was surely drawing near. Following my first impulse in this pressing emergency, I placed myself forward in the boat, and, seizing a handful of green blades on either side of it, endeavored, by violently pulling upon them, to force the craft through the thick growth which surrounded it. The headway of the skiff was slow, but my efforts were not silent. In fact, the commotion occasioned by my own panic became, to my hearing, so confounded with the sound made by my floundering pursuer that my excited imagination multiplied the single supposed bear, and the water seemed to be dashed about by several formidable 'grizzlies.'

'You smile, gentlemen, but really I was so impressed with this and like extravagant creations of fear that my better judgment was temporarily suspended. This deception, however, was only of momentary duration.

'Suddenly the skiff encountered some obstacle and remained immovable. Quickly clutching my gun and firing it aimlessly, I sprang overboard, and, with extraordinary energy, made for the other side of the river and safety.

'My remembrance of that hazardous crossing even now fills me with a sympathetic thrill. The river, near where I had leaped in, varied in depth from my middle to my neck, and the snaky stalks of tule clung to me, retarding my retreat like faithful allies of the enemy. An area of this plant extended to the channel, a distance of some fifty yards, where a clear current rendered swimming feasible; and this I essayed to reach, urged onward by terror, and regardless of ordinary obstructions. So vigorous was my action that, notwithstanding the frequent reversals of my head and 'head's antipodes' as I tripped over reeds and roots, perhaps I should have reached the 'point proposed' with only a loss equivalent to the proverbial 'year's growth,' had not a hidden snag unluckily lain in the way, which 'by hook or by crook' fastened itself in the part of my trowsers exactly corresponding, when dry, with that 'broad disk of drab' finally seen, after much anxiety, by the curious Geoffrey Crayon between the parted coat-skirts of a certain mysterious 'Stout Gentleman,' and inextricably held me in check despite my frantic struggles.

'Imagine my feelings while thus entangled by a bond of enduring material, a bait for a fierce brute which eagerly pressed forward to snap at me. Believe me, boys, this was not the happiest moment of my life. I knew no reason why I should resignedly submit to so undistinguished a fate. My knife, however, was in the boat, so that my release could only be attained by extreme exertion. Accordingly I writhed and jerked with my 'best violence,' all the time denouncing the whole race of bears, from 'Noah's pets' down; and you may be sure, emphatically expressing not a very exalted opinion of snags.

'Ah! how that brief period of horrible suspense appeared to stretch out almost to the crack of doom. I roared lustily for help, but no aid came. The bear continued its course through the thicket; in another instant I might be seized.

'Rather than suffer such a 'taking off' as this, which now seemed inevitable, I should have welcomed as an easy death any method of exit from life that I might hitherto have deprecated. Incited then by the proximity of the beast, which so intensified the horror of my situation, to a last desperate effort to avert this much dreaded fate; and, concentrating nearly a superhuman strength upon one impetuous bound, the stubborn fabric burst, and—joy possessed my soul!

'Even greater than my recent misery was the ecstasy which succeeded my liberation. The happy sense of relief imparted to me such a feeling of buoyancy that I was enabled to extricate myself from this 'slough of despond,' and I soon reached the swift current, when a few strokes landed me in security on a jutting bar.

'Without unnecessary delay I sought out my comrades, to whom I told the story of my escape. Their response was a hearty laugh, and certain equivocal words which might imply doubt—not as to my fright, for that was too plain—but concerning the identity of the 'grizzly.' I observed, however, that, as they rowed nearer to the scene of my disaster, their display of levity lessened; and as we came within sight of the suspicious locality, there was not the 'ghost of a joke' on board; but, on the contrary, thay both charged me to 'keep a bright look out,' as well as to 'see that the arms were all right,' thus showing a remarkable diminution of their previous incredulity.

'While cautiously exploring the vicinity of my memorable flight, we saw the bear in the distance, upon a piece of rising ground. It moved off with a lumbering shuffle and probably a contented stomach, for, on searching for my scattered game, we found but little of it left besides sundry fragments and many feathers.'

* * * * *

In the old times people received queer names, and plenty of them. On Long Island a Mr. Crabb named a child 'Through-much-tribulation-we-enter-into-the-kingdom-of-heaven Crabb.' The child went by the name of Tribby. Scores of such names could be cited. The practice of giving long and curious names is not yet out of date. In Saybrook, Conn., is a family by the name of Beman, whose children are successively named as follows:

1. Jonathan Hubbard Lubbard Lambard Hunk Dan Dunk Peter Jacobus Lackany Christian Beman.

2. Prince Frederick Henry Jacob Zacheus Christian Beman.

3. Queen Caroline Sarah Rogers Ruhamah Christian Beman.

4. Charity Freelove Ruth Grace Mercy Truth Faith and Hope and Peace pursue I'll have no more to do for that will go clear through Christian Beman.

Some of the older American names were not unmusical. In a Genealogical Register open before us we frequently find Dulcena, Eusena, Sabra, and Norman; 'Czarina' also occurs. Rather peculiar at the present day are Puah and Azoa (girls), Albion, Ardelia, Philomelia, Serepta, Persis, Electa, Typhenia, Lois, Selim, Damarias, Thankful, Sephemia, Zena, Experience, Hilpa, Penninnah, Juduthum, Freelove, Luthena, Meriba (this lady married 'Oney Anness' at Providence, R.I., in 1785), Paris, Francena, Vienna, Florantina, Phedora, Azuba, Achsah, Alma, Arad, Asenah, Braman, Cairo, Candace, China (this was a Miss Ware—China Ware—who married Moses Bullen at Sherburne, Mass., in 1805), Curatia, Deliverance, Diadema, Electus, Hopestill, Izanna, Loannis, Loravia, Lovice, Orilla, Orison, Osro, Ozoro, Permelia, Philinda, Roavea, Rozilla, Royal, Salmon, Saloma, Samantha, Silence, Siley, Alamena, Eda, Aseneth, Bloomy, Syrell, Geneora, Burlin, Idella, Hadasseh, Patrora (Martainly), Allethina, Philura, and Zebina.

Some of these names are still extant—most have become obsolete. It would be a commendable idea should some scholar publish a work containing the Names of all Nations!

* * * * *

Doubtless the reader has heard much of the Wandering Jew and of his trials, but we venture to say that he has probably not encountered a more affecting state of the case than is set forth in the following lyric, translated from the German, in which language it is entitled 'Ahasver,' and beginneth as follows:

THE EVERLASTING OLD JEW.

'Ich bin der alte Ahasver, Ich wand're hin, Ich wand're her. Mein Ruh ist hin, Mein Herz ist schwer, Ich finde sie nimmer, Und nimmermehr.'

I am the old Ahasuer; I wander here, I wander there. My rest is gone, My heart is sair; I find it never, And nevermair.

Loud roars the storm, The milldams tear; I cannot perish, O malheur! My heart is void, My head is bare; I am the old Ahasuer.

Belloweth ox And danceth bear, I find them never, Never mair. I'm the old Hebrew On a tare; I order arms: My heart is sair.

I'm goaded round, I know not where: I wander here, I wander there. I'd like to sleep, But must forbear: I am the old Ahasuer.

I meet folks alway Unaware: My rest is gone, I'm in despair. I cross all lands, The sea I dare: I travel here, I wander there.

I feel each pain, I sometimes swear: I am the old Ahasuer. Criss-cross I wander Anywhere; I find it never, Never mair.

Against the wale I lean my spear; I find no quiet, I declare. My peace is lost, My heart is sair: I swing like pendulum in air.

I'm hard of hearing, You're aware? Curacoa is A fine liqueur. I 'listed once En militaire: I find no comfort Anywhere.

But what's to stop it? Pray declare! My peace is gone. My heart is sair: I am the old Ahasuer. Now I know nothing, Nothing mair.

Truly a hard case, and one far surpassing the paltry picturing of Eugene Sue. There is a vagueness of mind and a senile bewilderment manifested in this poem, which is indeed remarkable.

* * * * *

One fine day, some time ago, SAVIN and PIDGEON were walking down Fifth avenue to their offices.

A funeral was starting from No. —. On the door plate was the word IRVING.

'Such is life,' said Savin. 'All that is mortal of the great essayist is being borne to the grave: in fact, the cold and silent tomb.'

A tear came to Pidgeon's eye. Pidgeon has an enthusiastic veneration for genius. He adores literary talent.

'Savin,' said he, 'there is a seat vacant in this carriage. I will enter it, and pay my last tribute of respect to the illustrious departed. But I thought he had a place up the river.'

'This was his town house,' said Savin. 'How I should like to join with you in your thoughtful remembrance, and in your somewhat unceleritous journey to the churchyard! But, no, the case of Blackbridge vs. Bridgeblack will be called at twelve, and I have no time to lose.'

Pidgeon entered the carriage. There was a large man on the seat, but Pigeon found room beside him. The carriage slowly moved off. Pidgeon put his handkerchief to his eyes; the large man coughed and took a chew of tobacco.

Presently said Pidgeon:

'We are following to the grave the remains of a splendid writer.'

'Uncommon,' said the large man. 'Sech a man with a pen I never see—ekalled by few, and excelled by none; copperplate wasn't nowhere.'

'Indeed,' replied Pidgeon, 'I wasn't aware his chirography was so unusually elegant; but his books were magnificent, weren't they? So equable, too, and without that bold speculation that we too often meet with, nowadays.'

'Ah, you may well say so,' returned the large man. 'He always kept them himself; had 'em sent up to his house whenever he was sick, likeways; but he wasn't without his bold speculations neither. Look at that there operation of his into figs, last year.'

'Figs!'

'Figs, yes; and there was dates into the same cargo.'

'Dates! figs! My good friend, do you mean to say that the great Washington Irving speculated in groceries?'

'Lord, no, not that I know of. This here is Josh Irving, whose remains'—

Pidgeon opened the carriage door, and, being agile, got out without stopping the procession. Arriving at his office, where the boy was diligently occupied in sticking red wafers over the velvet of his desk lid, he took down 'Sugden on Vendors,' to ascertain if there was any legal remedy for the manner in which he had been sold, and at the latest dates had unsuccessfully travelled nearly half through that very entertaining volume.

THERE is no time to be lost. Either the Union is to be made stronger, or it is to perish; and the sooner every man's position is defined, the better. If you are opposed to the war, say so, and step over to Secession, but do not falter and equivocate, croak and grumble, and play the bat of the fable. The manly, good, old-fashioned Democrats, at least, are above this, and are rapidly dividing from the copperheads. The Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, a staunch patriotic journal, says:

'The sooner that the fact is made clear that the mass of the Democrats, as well as of all other parties, are loyal and opposed to the infamous teachings of Vallandigham, Biddle, Reed, Ingersoll, Wood, and their compeers, the sooner will the war be brought to an end and the Union be restored.'

Show your colors. Let us know at once who and what everybody is, in this great struggle.

* * * * *

LOVE-LIFE.

In a forest lone, 'neath a mossy stone, Pale flowrets grew: No sunlight fell in the sombre dell, Raindrop nor dew.

Bring them to light, where all is bright, See if they grow? Yes, stem and leaf are green, While, hid in crimson sheen, The petals glow.

Girl blossoms, too, love the sun and dew, And the soft air: Hidden from love's eye they fade and die, In city low or cloister high, Yes, everywhere.

Give them but love, the fire from above, And they will grow, The once cold children of the gloom, Rich in their bloom, shedding perfume On high and low.

* * * * *

We beg leave to remind our readers that Mr. LELAND'S new book, Sunshine in Thought, retail price $1, is given as a premium to all who subscribe $3 in advance to the CONTINENTAL MONTHLY. Will the reader permit us to call attention to the following notice of the work from the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin:

'A beautiful volume, entitled Sunshine in Thought, by Charles Godfrey Leland, has just been published by Charles T. Evans. No work from Mr. Leland's pen has afforded us so much pleasure, and we recommend it to all who want and relish bright, refreshing, cheering reading. It consists of a number of essays, the main idea of which is to inculcate joyousness in thought and feeling, in opposition to the sickly, sentimental seriousness which is so much affected in literature and in society. That a volume based on this one idea should be filled with reading that is never tiresome, is a proof of great cleverness. But Mr. Leland's varied learning, and his extensive acquaintance with foreign as well as English literature, combine with his native talent to qualify him for such a work. He has done nothing so well, not even his admirable translation of Heine's Reisebilder. He is thoroughly imbued with the spirit of his motto, 'Hilariter,' and in expressing his bright thoughts, he has been peculiarly felicitous in style. Nothing of his that we have read shows so much elegance and polish. Every chapter in the book is delightful, but we especially enjoyed that on 'Tannhaeuser,' with the fine translation and subsequent elucidation of the famous legend.' But the boldest and most original chapter is the concluding one, with its strange speculations on 'The Musical After-Life of the Soul,' and the after-death experience of 'Dione' and 'Bel-er-oph-on,' which the author characterizes in the conclusion as 'an idle, fantastic, foolish dream.' So it may be, but it is as vividly told as any dream of the Opium-Eater or the Hasheesh-Eater. Mr. Leland is to be congratulated on his Sunshine in Thought. It is a book that will be enjoyed by every reader of culture, and its effect will be good wherever it is read.'

The aim proposed in this work is one of great interest at the present time, or, as the Philadelphia North American declares, 'is a great and noble one'—'to aid in fully developing the glorious problem of freeing labor from every drawback, and of constantly raising it and intellect in the social scale.' 'Mr. LELAND believes that one of the most powerful levers for raising labor to its true position in the estimation of the world, is the encouragement of cheerfulness and joyousness in every phase of literature and of practical life.' 'The work is one long, glowing sermon, the text of which is the example of Jesus Christ.'

E. K.

BUST-HEAD WHISKEY.

For two days the quiet of the Rising Sun Tavern, in the quaint little town of Shearsville, Ohio, was disturbed by a drunken Democratic member of the Pennsylvania Legislature, who visited the town in order to address what he hoped would turn out to be the assembled multitude of copperheads, but which proved after all no great snakes!

For two days this worthless vagabond insulted travellers stopping at the tavern, until at last the landlord's wife, a woman of some intelligence, determined to have her revenge, since no man on the premises had pluck enough to give the sot the thrashing he so well merited.

On the third day, after a very severe night's carouse on bust-head whiskey, the Pennsylvanian appeared at the breakfast table, looking sadly the worse for wear, and having an awful headache. The landlady having previously removed the only looking glass in the tavern—one hanging in the barroom—said to the beast as he sat down to table:

'Poor man! oh, what is the matter with your face? It is terribly swollen, and your whole head too. Can't I do something for you? send for the doctor, or'—

The legislator, who was in a state of half-besottedness, listened with sharp ears to this remark, but believing the landlady was only making fun of him, interrupted her with—

'There ain't nothin' the matter with my head. I'm all right; only a little headache what don't 'mount to nothing.'

But a man who sat opposite to him at table, and who had his clue from the landlady, said with an alarmed look—

'I say, mister, I don't know it's any of my business, but I'll be hanged for a horse thief, if your head ain't swelled up twicet its nat'ral size. You'd better do something for it, I'm thinking.'

The drunken legislator! (Legislator, n. One who makes laws for a state: vide dictionary) believing at last that his face must in fact be swollen, since several other travellers, who were in the plot, also spoke to him of his shocking appearance, got up from the table and went out to the barroom to consult the looking glass, such luxuries not being placed in the chambers. But there was no glass there. After some time he found the landlady, and she told him that the barroom glass was broken, but she could lend him a small one; which she at once gave him.

The poor sot, with trembling hand, held it in front of his face, and looked in.

'Well,' said he, 'if that ain't a swelled head I hope I may never be a senator! or sell my vote again at Harrisburg.'

'Poor man!' exclaimed the bystanders.

'Fellers,' said the legislator, 'wot d'ye think I'd better do?' Here he gave another hard look in the glass. 'I ought to be back in Harrisburg right off, but I cant go with a head like that onto me. Nobody'd give me ten cents to vote for 'em with such a head as that. It's a'—

'Big thing,' interrupted a bystander.

'Fellers,' said the blackguard, 'I'll kill a feller any day of the week, with old rye, if he'll only tell er feller how to cure this head of mine.'

'Have it shaved, sir, by all means,' spoke the landlady: 'shaved at once, and then a mild fly blister will draw out the inflammation, and the swelling will go down. Don't you think so, doctor?'

The doctor thus addressed was a cow doctor, but, accustomed to attending brutes, his advice was worth something in the present case; so he also recommended shaving and blistering.

'I'll go git the barber right off the reel, sha'n't I?' asked the doctor, to which the legislator assenting, it chanced that in fifteen minutes his head was as bald as a billiard ball, and in a few more was covered with a good-sized fly blister.

'Ouch—good woman—how it hurts!' he cried. But that was only the beginning of it.

'Ee-ea-ah!' he roared, as it grew hotter and hotter. One might have heard him a mile. The neighbors did hear it, and rushed in. The joke was 'contaminated' round among them, and they enjoyed it. He had disgusted them all.

'Golly! what a big head!' cried a bystander.

The legislator took another look at the glass. They held it about a yard from him.

'It's gittin' smaller, ain't it?' he groaned.

'Yes, it's wiltin',' said the landlady. 'Now go to bed.'

He went, and on rising departed. Whether he ever became an honest man is not known, but the legend says he has from that day avoided 'bust-head whiskey.'

* * * * *

Don't you see it, reader? The landlady had shown him his face in a convex mirror—one of those old-fashioned things, which may occasionally be found in country taverns.

* * * * *

WAR-WAIFS.

The chronicles of war in all ages show us that this internecine strife into which we of the North have been driven by those who will eventually rue the necessity, is by no manner of means the first in which brother has literally been pitted against brother in the deadly 'tug of war.' The fiercest conflict of the kind, however, which we can at present call up from the memory of past readings, was one in which THEODEBERT, king of Austria, took the field against his own brother, THIERRI, king of Burgundy. Historians tell us that, so close was the hand-to-hand fighting in this battle, slain soldiers did not fall until the melee was over, but were borne to and fro in an upright position amid the serried ranks.

* * * * *

Although many and many of England's greatest battles have been won for her by her Irish soldiers, it is not always that the latter can be depended upon by her. With the Celt, above all men, 'blood is thicker than water;' and, although he is very handy at breaking the head of another Celt with a blackthorn 'alpeen,' in a free faction fight, he objects to making assaults upon his fellow countrymen with the 'pomp and circumstance of war.' A striking instance of this occurred during the Irish rebellion of 1798. The 5th Royal Irish Light Dragoons refused to charge upon a body of the rebels when the word was given. Not a man or horse stirred from the ranks. Here was a difficult card to play, now, for the authorities, because it would have been inconvenient to try the whole regiment by court martial, and the soldiers were quite too valuable to be mowed down en masse. The only course left was to disband the regiment, which was done. The disaffected men were distributed into regiments serving in India and other remote colonies, and the officers, none of whom, we believe, were involved in the mutiny, were provided for in various quarters. The circumstance was commemorated in a curious way. It was ordered that the 5th Royal Irish Light Dragoons should be erased from the records of the army list, in which a blank between the 4th and 6th Dragoons should remain forever, as a memorial of disgrace. For upward of half a century this gap remained in the army list, as anybody may see by referring to any number of that publication of half-a-dozen years back. The regiment was revived during, or just after, the Crimean war, and the numbers in the army list are once more complete.