Lord Holland dwells at some length on the treatment to which Napoleon was subjected by the English Government, and on the generous attempts of Lady Holland to alleviate his captivity. This part of the volume has much present interest, and will be read with great eagerness by all. Of the Emperor's temper, he says:

"Napoleon, even in the plenitude of his power, seldom gratified his revenge by resorting to any act either illegal or unjust, though he frequently indulged his ill-humor by speaking both of and to those who had displeased him in a manner mortifying to their feelings and their pride. The instances of his love of vengeance are very few: they are generally of an insolent rather than a sanguinary character, more discreditable to his head than his heart, and a proof of his want of manners, taste, and possibly feeling, but not of a dye to affect his humanity. Of what man, possessed of such extended yet such disputed authority, can so much be said? Of Washington? Of Cromwell? But Washington, if he had ever equal provocation and motives for revenge, certainly never possessed such power to gratify it. His glory, greater in truth than that of Caesar, Cromwell, and Bonaparte, was that he never aspired: but he disdained such power; he never had it, and cannot therefore deserve immoderate praise for not exerting what he did not possess. In the affair of General Lee, he did not, if I recollect, show much inclination to forgive. Even Cromwell did not possess the power of revenge to the same extent as Napoleon. There is reason, however, to infer from his moderation and forbearance that he would have used it as sparingly. But Cromwell is less irreproachable, on the score of another vice, viz., ingratitude. Napoleon not only never forgot a favor, but, unlike most ambitious characters, never allowed subsequent injuries to cancel his recollection of services. He was uniformly indulgent to the faults of those whom he had once distinguished. He saw them, he sometimes exposed and rectified, but he never punished or revenged them. Many have blamed him for this on the score of policy; but if it was not sense and calculation, it should be ascribed to good-nature. None, I presume, will impute it to weakness or want of discernment."

This account of Napoleon's ideas on religion is curious, and we think new.

"Whatever were the religious sentiments of this extraordinary man, such companions were likely neither to fix nor to shake, to sway nor to alter them. I have been at some pains to ascertain the little that can be known of his thoughts on such subjects, and, though it is not very satisfactory, it appears to me worth recording.

"In the early periods of the Revolution, he, in common with many of his countrymen, conformed to the fashion of treating all such matters, both in conversation and action, with levity and even derision. In his subsequent career, like most men exposed to wonderful vicissitudes, he professed, half in jest and half in earnest, a sort of confidence in fatalism and predestination. But on some solemn public occasions, and yet more in private and sober discussion, he not only gravely disclaimed and reproved infidelity, but both by actions and words implied his conviction that a conversion to religious enthusiasm might befal himself, or any other man. He had more than tolerance—he had indulgence and respect for extravagant and ascetic notions of religious duty. He grounded that feeling not on their soundness or their truth, but on the uncertainty of what our minds may be reserved for, on the possibility of our being prevailed upon to admit and even to devote ourselves to tenets which at first excite our derision. It has been observed that there was a tincture of Italian superstition in his character; a sort of conviction from reason that the doctrines of revelation were not true, and yet a persuasion, or at least an apprehension, that he might live to think them so. He was satisfied that the seeds of belief were deeply sown in the human heart. It was on that principle that he permitted and justified, though he did not dare to authorize, the revival of La Trappe and other austere orders. He contended that they might operate as a safety-valve for the fanatical and visionary ferment which would otherwise burst forth and disturb society. In his remarks on the death of Duroc, and in the reasons he alleged against suicide, both in calm and speculative discussion and in moments of strong emotion, (such as occurred at Fontainbleau in 1814,) he implied a belief both in fatality and Providence.

"In the programme of his coronation, a part of the ceremony was to consist in his taking the communion. But when the plan was submitted to him, he, to the surprise of those who had drawn it, was absolutely indignant at the suggestion. 'No man,' he said, 'had the means of knowing, or had the right to say, when or where he would take the sacrament, or whether he would or not.' On this occasion, he added, that he would not; nor did he.

"There is some mystery about his conduct in similar respects at St. Helena, and during the last days of his life. He certainly had mass celebrated in his chapel while he was well, and in his bedroom when ill. But though I have reason to believe that the last sacraments were actually administered to him privately a few days before his death, and probably after confession, yet Count Montholon, from whom I derive indirectly my information, also stated that he received Napoleon's earnest and distinct directions to conceal all the preliminary preparations for that melancholy ceremony from all his other companions, and even to enjoin the priest, if questioned, to say he acted by Count Montholon's orders, but had no knowledge of the Emperor's wishes.

"It seems as if he had some desire for such assurance as the Church could give, but yet was ashamed to own it. He knew that some at St. Helena, and more in France, would deem his recourse to such consolation infirmity; perhaps he deemed it so himself. Religion may sing her triumph, philosophy exclaim 'pauvre humanite,' more impartial scepticism despair of discovering the motive, but truth and history must, I believe, acknowledge the fact."

FOOTNOTES:

[H] Foreign Reminiscences. By Henry Richard Lord Holland. Edited by his Son, Henry Edward Lord Holland. Longman and Co., London. New-York: Harpers.



JOHN JAMES AUDUBON.

By Rufus W. Griswold.

"Formerly," said Baron Cuvier, in a report to the Royal Academy of Sciences in Paris, "European naturalists had to make known her own treasures to America; but now her Mitchells, Harlans, and Charles Bonapartes, have repaid with interest the debt which she owed to Europe. The history of the American birds by Wilson, already equals in elegance our most beautiful works in ornithology, and if ever that of Audubon be completed, it will have to be confessed that in magnificence of execution the Old World is surpassed by the New." The work of the "American backwoodsman" thus alluded to, has long been completed; the great Cuvier subsequently acknowledged it to be "the most splendid monument which art has erected in honor of ornithology;" and the judgment of mankind has placed the name of our countryman first in the list of authors and artists who have illustrated the beautiful branch of natural history to which he has devoted so large a portion of his long and heroic life.

JOHN JAMES AUDUBON was born in Louisiana about the year 1782. He was of French descent, and his parents perceiving early the bent of his genius sent him to Paris to pursue his education. While there he attended schools of natural history and the arts, and in drawing took lessons from the celebrated David. He returned in his eighteenth year, and his father soon after gave him a farm near Philadelphia, where the Perkioming creek falls into the Schuylkill. Its fine woods offered him numerous subjects for his pencil, and he here commenced that series of drawings which ultimately swelled into the magnificent collection of The Birds of America. Here too he was married, and here was born his eldest son. He engaged in commercial speculations, but was not successful. His love for the fields and flowers, the forests and their winged inhabitants, we readily suppose unfitted him for trade. At the end of ten years he removed to the west. There were then no steamboats on the Ohio, and few villages and no cities on its shores. Reaching that noble river in the warm days of autumn, he purchased a small boat in which, with his wife and child and two rowers, he leisurely pursued his way down to Henderson, in Kentucky, where his family resided several years. He appears at first to have engaged in commerce, for he mentions his meeting with Wilson, of whom till then he had never heard, as having occurred in his counting-room in Louisville in the spring of 1810. His great predecessor was procuring subscriptions for his work. He called on Audubon, explained the nature of his occupations, and requested his patronage. The merchant was surprised and gratified at the sight of his volumes, and had taken a pen to add his name to the list of subscribers, when his partner abruptly said to him in French, "My dear Audubon, what induces you to do so? your own drawings are certainly far better, and you must know as much of the habits of American birds as this gentleman. "Wilson probably understood the remark, for he appeared not to be pleased, and inquired whether Audubon had any drawings of birds. A large portfolio was placed upon the table, and all its contents exhibited by the amateur ornithologist. Wilson was surprised; he had supposed he was himself the only person engaged in forming such a collection; and asked if it was intended to publish them. Audubon replied in the negative: he had never thought of presenting the fruits of his labors to the world. Wilson was still more surprised; he lost his cheerfulness; and though before he left Louisville Audubon explored with him the neighboring woods, loaned him his drawings, and in other ways essayed to promote his interests and happiness, he shook the dust from his feet when he departed, and wrote in his diary that "literature or art had not a friend in the place." Far be it from me to write a word in dispraise of Alexander Wilson. He was a man of genius, enthusiasm, and patient endurance; an honor to the country of his birth, and a glory to that of his adoption; but he evidently could not bear the thought of being excelled. With all his merits he was even then greatly inferior to Audubon, and his heart failed him when he contrasted the performances which had won fame for him with those of the unknown lover of the same mistress, Nature, whom he thus encountered.

Audubon must soon have abandoned or neglected his day-books and ledgers, for in 1811 we find him with his rifle and drawing paper among the bayous of Florida, and in the following years making long and tedious journeys, searching the forests and prairies, the shores of rivers, lakes, gulfs, and seas, for the subjects of his immortal work, of the publication of which, however, he had never yet had a thought.

On the fifth of April, 1824, he visited Philadelphia, where the late Dr. Mease, whom he had known on his first arrival in Pennsylvania, presented him to Charles Lucien Bonaparte, who in his turn introduced him to the Lyceum of Natural History. He perceived that he could look for no patronage in this city, and so proceeded to New-York, where he was received with a kindness well suited to elevate his depressed spirits, and afterwards ascending the Hudson, went westward to the great lakes, and in the wildest solitudes of the pathless forests renewed his labors. He now began to think of visiting Europe; the number of his drawings had greatly increased notwithstanding a misfortune by which two hundred of them, representing nearly a thousand birds, had been destroyed; and he fancied his work under the hands of the engraver. "Happy days and nights of pleasing dreams" followed, as he retired farther from the haunts of men, determined to leave nothing undone which could be accomplished by time or toil. Another year and a half passed by; he returned to his family, then in Louisiana; and having explored the woods of that state, at last sailed for England, where he arrived in 1826. In Liverpool and Manchester his works procured him a generous reception from the most distinguished men of science and letters; and when he proceeded to Edinburgh and exhibited there his four hundred paintings, "the hearts of all warmed toward Audubon," says Professor Wilson, "who were capable of conceiving the difficulties, dangers, and sacrifices that must have been encountered, endured, and overcome before genius could have embodied these, the glory of its innumerable triumphs."[I] "The man himself," at this period writes the same eloquent author in another work, "is just what you would expect from his productions; full of fine enthusiasm and intelligence, most interesting in his looks and manners, a perfect gentleman, and esteemed by all who know him for the simplicity and frankness of his nature."[J]

His reception encouraged him to proceed immediately with his plans of publication. It was a vast undertaking which it would take probably sixteen years to accomplish, and when his first drawings were delivered to the engraver he had not a single subscriber. His friends pointed out the rashness of the project and urged him to abandon it. "But my heart was nerved," he exclaims, "and my reliance on that Power on whom all must depend brought bright anticipations of success." Leaving his work in the care of his engravers and agents, in the summer of 1828 he visited Paris, and received the homage of the most distinguished men of science in that capital. Humboldt too, whose gigantic intelligence arose above all others in central Europe, became his warm friend, and remained until his death a sympathizing correspondent.

The ensuing winter was passed in London, and in April, 1829, he returned to America to explore anew the woods of the middle and southern states. Accompanied by his wife he left New Orleans on the eighth of January, 1830, for New-York, and on the twenty-fifth of April, just a year from the time of his departure, he was again in the Great Metropolis. Before the close of 1830, he had issued his first volume, containing one hundred plates, representing ninety-nine species of birds, every figure of the size and colors of life. The applause with which it was received was enthusiastic and universal. The kings of England and France had placed their names at the head of his subscription list; he was made a fellow of the Royal Societies of London and Edinburgh; a member of the Natural History Society of Paris, and other celebrated institutions; and Cuvier, Swainson, and indeed the great ornithologists of every country, exhausted the words of panegyric in his praise.

On the first of August, 1831, Audubon arrived once more in New-York, and having passed a few days with his friends there and in Philadelphia, proceeded to Washington, where the President and other principal officers of the government gave him letters of assistance and protection to be used all along the coasts and inland frontiers where there were collectors of revenue or military or naval forces. He had previously received similar letters from the king's ministers to the authorities of the British colonies.

The next winter and spring were passed in the Floridas and in Charleston; and early in the summer, bending his course northward to keep pace with the birds in their migrations, he arrived in Philadelphia, where he was joined by his family. The cholera was then spreading death and terror through the country, and on reaching Boston he was himself arrested by sickness and detained until the middle of August. "Although I have been happy in forming many valuable friendships in various parts of the world, all dearly cherished by me," he says, "the outpouring of kindness which I experienced in Boston far exceeded all that I have ever met with;"[K] and he tells us, with characteristic enthusiasm, of his gratitude to the Appletons, Everetts, Quincys, Pickerings, Parkmans, and other eminent gentlemen and scholars of that beautiful and hospitable city.

Proceeding at length upon his mission, he explored the forests of Maine and New Brunswick, and the shores of the Bay of Fundy, and chartering a vessel at Eastport, sailed for the gulf of St. Lawrence, the Magdalen Islands, and the coast of Labrador. Returning as the cold season approached, he visited Newfoundland and Nova Scotia, and rejoining his family proceeded to Charleston, where he spent the winter, and in the spring, after nearly three years' travel and research, sailed a third time for England.

Among the warmest of his British friends, was always the congenial Wilson, great as a poet, greater as critic, and greatest of all as the author of the Noctes Ambrosianae, which contain more wit and humor, more sound theology, philosophy, and politics, and better and more various literature, than any other man now living has furnished in a single work. This almost universal genius, whose relish for the rod and gun and wild wood was scarcely less than that he felt for the best suppers of Ambrose, or the sharpest onslaught on the Whigs in Parliament, thoroughly appreciated and heartily loved our illustrious countryman, and in Blackwood's Magazine for January, 1835, he gives us the following admirable sketch of the visit he now made to Edinburgh:

"We were sitting one night, lately, all alone by ourselves, almost unconsciously eyeing the members, fire without flame, in the many-visioned grate, but at times aware of the symbols and emblems there beautifully built up, of the ongoings of human life, when a knocking, not loud but resolute, came to the front door, followed by the rustling thrill of the bell-wire, and then by a tinkling far below, too gentle to waken the house that continued to enjoy the undisturbed dream of its repose. At first we supposed it might be but some late-home-going knight-errant from a feast of shells, in a mood, 'between malice and true-love,' seeking to disquiet the slumbers of Old Christopher, in expectation of seeing his night-cap (which he never wears) popped out of the window, and of hearing his voice (of which he is charry in the open air) simulating a scold upon the audacious sleep-breaker. So we benevolently laid back our head on our easy-chair, and pursued our speculations on the state of affairs in general—and more particularly on the floundering fall of that inexplicable people—the Whigs. We had been wondering, and of our wondering found no end, what could have been their chief reasons for committing suicide. It appeared a case of very singular felo-de-se—for they had so timed the 'rash act,' as to excite strong suspicions in the public mind that his Majesty had committed murder. Circumstances, however, had soon come to light, that proved to demonstration, that the wretched Ministry had laid violent hands on itself, and effected its purpose by strangulation. There—was the fatal black ring visible round the neck—through a mere thread; there—were the blood-shot eyes protruding from the sockets; there—the lip-biting teeth clenched in the last convulsions; and there—sorriest sight of all—was the ghastly suicidical smile, last relic of the laughter of despair. But the knocking would not leave the door—and listening to its character, we were assured that it came from the fist of a friend, who saw light through the chinks of the shutter, and knew, moreover, that we never put on the shroud of death's pleasant brother sleep, till 'ae wee short hour ayont the twal,' and often not till earliest cock-crow, which chanticleer utters somewhat drowsily, and then replaces his head beneath his wing, supported on one side by a partlet, on the other by a hen. So we gathered up our slippered feet from the rug, lamp in hand stalked along the lobbies, unchained and unlocked the oak which our faithful night porter Somnus had sported—and lo! a figure muffled up in a cloak, and furred like a Russ, who advanced familiarly into the hall, extended both hands and then embracing us, bade God bless us, and pronounced, with somewhat of a foreign accent, the name in which we and the world rejoice—Christopher North!' We were not slow in returning the hug fraternal—for who was it but the 'American Woodsman?'—even Audubon himself—fresh from the Floridas—and breathing of the pure air of far-off Labrador!

"Three years and upwards had fled since we had taken farewell of the illustrious Ornithologist—on the same spot—at the same hour; and there was something ghostlike in such return of a dear friend from a distant region—almost as if from the land of spirits. It seemed as if the same moon again looked at us—but then she was wan and somewhat sad—now clear as a diamond, and all the starry heavens wore a smile. "Our words they were na mony feck'—but in less time than we have taken to write it—we two were sitting cheek by jowl, and hand in hand, by that essential fire—while we showed by our looks that we both felt, now they were over, that three years were but as one day! The cane coal-scuttle, instinct with spirit, beeted the fire of its own accord, without word or beck of ours, as if placed there by the hands of one of our wakeful Lares; in globe of purest crystal the Glenlivet shone; unasked the bright brass kettle began to whisper its sweet 'under song;' and a centenary of the fairest oysters native to our isle turned towards us their languishing eyes, unseen the Nereid that had on the instant wafted them from the procreant cradle beds of Prestonpans. Grace said, we drew in to supper, and hobnobbing, from elegant long-shank, down each naturalist's gullet graciously descended, with a gurgle, the mildest, the meekest, the very Moses of Ales.

"Audubon, ere half an hour had elapsed, found an opportunity of telling us that he had never seen us in a higher state of preservation—and in a low voice whispered something about the eagle renewing his youth. We acknowledged the kindness by a remark on bold bright birds of passage that find the seasons obedient to their will, and wing their way through worlds still rejoicing in the perfect year. But too true friends were we not to be sincere in all we seriously said; and while Audubon confessed that he saw rather more plainly than when we parted the crowfeet in the corners of our eyes, we did not deny that we saw in him an image of the Falco Lencocephalus, for that, looking on his 'carum caput,' it answered his own description of that handsome and powerful bird, viz. 'the general color of the plumage above is dull hair-brown, the lower parts being deeply brown, broadly margined with greyish white.' But here he corrected us: for 'surely, my dear friend,' quoth he, 'you must admit I am a living specimen of the Adult Bird, and you remember my description of him in my First Volume.' And thus blending our gravities and our gayeties, we sat facing one another, each with his last oyster on the prong of his trident, which disappeared, like all mortal joys, between a smile and a sigh.

"How similar—in much—our dispositions—yet in almost all how dissimilar our lives! Since last we parted, 'we scarcely heard of half a mile from home'—he tanned by the suns and beaten by the storms of many latitudes—we like a ship laid up in ordinary, or anchored close in shore within the same sheltering bay—with sails unfurled and flags flying but for sake of show on some holyday—he like a ship that every morning had been dashing through a new world of waves—often close-reefed or under bare poles—but oftener affronting the heavens with a whiter and swifter cloud than any hoisted by the combined fleets in the sky. And now, with canvas unrent, and masts unsprung, returned to the very buoy she left. Somewhat faded, indeed, in her apparelling—but her hull sound as ever—not a speck of dry rot in her timbers—her keel unscathed by rock—her cut-water yet sharp as new-whetted scythe ere the mower renews his toil—her figure-head, that had so often looked out for squalls, now 'patient as the brooding dove'—and her bowsprit—but let us man the main-brace; nor is there purer spirit—my trusty frere—in the Old World or the New.

"It was quite a Noctes. Audubon told us—by snatches—all his travels, history, with many an anecdote interspersed of the dwellers among the woods—bird, beast, and man.

"All this and more he told us, with a cheerful voice and animated eyes, while the dusky hours were noiselessly wheeling the chariot of Night along the star-losing sky; and we too had something to tell him of our own home-loving obscurity, not ungladdened by studies sweet in the Forest—till Dawn yoked her dappled coursers for one single slow stage—and then jocund Morn leaping up on the box, took the ribbons in her rosy fingers, and, after a dram of dew, blew her bugle, and drove like blazes right on towards the gates of Day."

"His great work," says Wilson, elsewhere, "was indeed a perilous undertaking for a stranger in Britain, without the patronage of powerful friends, and with no very great means of his own—all of which he embarked in the enterprise dearest to is heart. Had it failed, Audubon would have been a ruined man—and that fear must have sometimes dismally disturbed him, for he is not alone in life, and is a man of strong family affections. But happily those nearest his breast are as enthusiastic in the love of natural science as himself—and were all willing to sink or swim with the beloved husband and venerated father. America may well be proud of him—and he gratefully records the kindness he has experienced from so many of her most distinguished sons. In his own fame he is just and generous to all who excel in the same studies; not a particle of jealousy is in his composition; a sin, that, alas! seems too easily to beset too many of the most gifted spirits in literature and in science; nor is the happiest genius—imaginative or intellectual—such is the frailty of poor human nature at the best—safe from the access of that dishonouring passion."

The second volume of The Birds of America was finished in 1834, and in December of that year he published in Edinburgh the second volume of the Ornithological Biography. Soon after, while he was in London, a nobleman called upon him, with his family, and on examining some of his original drawings, and being told that it would still require eight years to complete the work, subscribed for it, saying, "I may not see it finished, but my children will." The words made a deep impression on Audubon. "The solemnity of his manner I could not forget for several days," he writes in the introduction to his third volume; "I often thought that neither might I see the work completed, but at length exclaimed, 'My sons may;' and now that another volume, both of my illustrations and of my biographies, is finished, my trust in Providence is augmented, and I cannot but hope that myself and my family together may be permitted to see the completion of my labors." When this was written, ten years had elapsed since the publication of his first plate. In the next three years, among other excursions he made one to the western coast of the Floridas and to Texas, in a vessel placed at his disposal by our government; and at the end of this time appeared the fourth and concluding volume of his engravings, and the fifth of his descriptions. The whole comprised four hundred and thirty-five plates, containing one thousand and sixty-five figures, from the Bird of Washington to the Humming Bird, of the size of life, and a great variety of land and marine views, and coral and other productions, of different climates and seasons, all carefully drawn and colored after nature. Well might the great naturalist felicitate himself upon the completion of his gigantic task. He had spent nearly half a century "amid the tall grass of the far-extended prairies of the west, in the solemn forests of the north, on the heights of the midland mountains, by the shores of the boundless ocean, and on the bosoms of our vast bays, lakes and rivers, searching for things hidden since the creation of this wondrous world from all but the Indian who has roamed in the gorgeous but melancholy wilderness." And speaking from the depth of his heart he says, "Once more surrounded by all the members of my dear family, enjoying the countenance of numerous friends who have never deserted me, and possessing a competent share of all that can render life agreeable, I look up with gratitude to the Supreme Being, and feel that I am happy."

In 1839, having returned for the last time to his native country and established himself with his family near the city of New-York, Audubon commenced the publication of The Birds of America in imperial octavo volumes, of which the seventh and last was issued in the summer of 1844. The plates in this edition, reduced from his larger illustrations, were engraved and colored in the most admirable manner by Mr. Bowen of Philadelphia, under the direction of the author, and excepting The Birds of America in folio, there has never been published so magnificent a work on ornithology.

Audubon was too sincere a worshipper of nature to be content with inglorious repose, even after having accomplished in action more than was ever dreamed of by any other naturalist; and while the "edition for the people" of his Birds of America was in course of publication, he was busy amid the forests and prairies, the reedy swamps of our southern shores, the cliffs that protect our eastern coasts, by the currents of the Mexican gulf and the tide streams of the Bay of Fundy, with his sons, Victor Gifford and John Woodhouse, making the drawings and writing the biographies of the Quadrupeds of America, a work in no respect inferior to that on our birds, which he began to publish about five years ago. The plates, on double imperial folio paper, engraved and colored by Mr. Bowen after the original drawings made from nature by Audubon and his sons, are even more magnificent than those of the Birds of America, which twenty years ago delighted and astonished the naturalists of Europe.

The Biography of American Quadrupeds, accompanying these plates, and of which the first volume appeared in New-York in 1846, was written principally by the Rev. John Bachman, D.D., of Charleston, a long-tried and enthusiastic friend, of whose introduction to him Audubon thus speaks in the preface of the second volume of his Ornithological Biography:

"It was late in the afternoon when we took our lodgings in Charleston. Being fatigued, and having written the substance of my journey to my family, and delivered a letter to the Rev. Mr. Gilman, I retired to rest. At the first glimpse of day the following morning, my assistants and myself were already several miles from the city, commencing our search in the fields and woods, and having procured abundance of subjects both for the pencil and the scalpel, we returned home, covered with mud, and so accoutred as to draw towards us the attention of every person in the streets. As we approached the boarding-house, I observed a gentleman on horseback close to our door. He looked at me, came up, inquired if my name was Audubon, and on being answered in the affirmative, instantly leaped from his saddle, shook me most cordially by the hand—there is much to be expressed and understood by a shake of the hand—and questioned me in so kind a manner, that I for a while felt doubtful how to reply. At his urgent desire, I removed to his house, as did my assistants. Suitable apartments were assigned to us; and once introduced to the lovely and interesting group that composed his family, I seldom passed a day without enjoying their society. Servants, carriages, horses, and dogs were all at our command, and friends accompanied us to the woods and plantations, and formed parties for water excursions. Before I left Charleston, I was truly sensible of the noble and generous spirit of the hospitable Carolinians."

Audubon and Bachman (the same Bachman who recently refuted the heresies of Agassiz respecting the unity of the human race) were from this time devoted friends and co-workers. For several years the health of the hero naturalist had declined, and he was rarely if ever seen beyond the limits of his beautiful estate on the banks of the Hudson, near this city, where, on the twenty-seventh of January, 1851, he died, full of years, and illustrious with the most desirable glory.

Audubon's highest claim to admiration is founded upon his drawings in natural history, in which he has exhibited a perfection never before attempted. In all our climates—in the clear atmosphere, by the dashing waters, amid the grand old forests with their peculiar and many-tinted foliage, by him first made known to art—he has represented our feathered tribes, building their nests and fostering their young, poised on the tip of the spray and hovering over the sedgy margin of the lake, flying in the clouds in quest of prey or from pursuit, in love, enraged, indeed in all the varieties of their motion and repose and modes of life, so perfectly that all other works of the kind are to his as stuffed skins to the living birds.

But he has also indisputable claims to a high rank as a man of letters. Some of his written pictures of birds, so graceful, clearly defined, and brilliantly colored, are scarcely inferior to the productions of his pencil. His powers of general description are not less remarkable. The waters seem to dance to his words as to music, and the lights and shades of his landscapes show the practised hand of a master. The evanescent shades of manners, also, upon the extreme frontiers, where the footprints of civilization have hardly crushed the green leaves, have been sketched with graphic fidelity in his journals.

No author has more individuality. The enthusiastic, trustful and loving spirit which breathes through his works distinguished the man. From the beginning he surrendered himself entirely to his favorite pursuit, and was intent to learn every thing from the prime teacher, Nature. His style as well as his knowledge was a fruit of his experiences. He had never written for the press until after the age at which most authors have established their reputation; and when he did write, his page glowed like the rich wild landscape in the spring, when Nature, then most beautiful, "bathes herself in her own dewy waters." We seem to hear his expressions of wondering admiration, as unknown mountains, valleys and lakes burst upon his view, as the deer at his approach leaped from his ambush into the deeper solitudes, as the startled bird with rushing wings darted from his feet into the sky; or his pious thanksgiving, as at the end of a weary day the song of the sparrow or the robin relieved his mind from the heavy melancholy that bore it down.

When the celebrated Buffon had completed the ornithological portion of his great work on natural history, he announced with unhesitating assurance that he had "finished the history of the birds of the world." Twenty centuries had served for the discovery of only eight hundred species, but this number seemed immense, and the short-sighted naturalist declared that the list would admit of "no material augmentation" which embraced hardly a sixteenth of those now known to exist. To this astonishing advance of the science of ornithology, no one has contributed more than Audubon, by his magnificent painting and fascinating history.

Mr. Audubon left unpublished a voluminous autobiography, which we hope will be published with as little delay as possible.

FOOTNOTES:

[I] Wilson's Miscellanies, vol. ii. p. 118.

[J] Noctes Ambrosianae, vol. ii. p. 103.

[K] Introduction to the second volume of Ornithological Biography, p. xvii.



Original Poetry.

OLD AGE.

By Alfred B. Street.

All day the chill bleak wind had shrieked and wailed Through leafless forests, and o'er meadows sear; Through the fierce sky great sable clouds had sailed; Outlines were hard—all nature's looks were drear. Gone, Indian Summer's bland, delicious haze, Thickening soft nights and filming mellow days. Then rose gray clouds; thin fluttered first the snow, Then like loose shaken fleeces, then in dense streams That muffled gradually all below In pearly smoothness. Then outburst the gleams At sunset; nature shone in flashing white, And the last rays tinged all with rosy light. So Life's bland Autumn o'er, may old age come In muffling peace, and death display hope's radiant bloom.

THE CASTLE IN THE AIR.[L]

By R. H. Stoddard.

I.

We have two lives about us, Within us, and without us; Two worlds in which we dwell, Alternate Heaven and Hell: Without, the sombre Real, Within our heart of hearts, the beautiful Ideal! I stand between the thresholds of the two, Fettered and bound with many a heavy chain; I strive to rend their links, but all in vain; The False is strong, and holds me from the True. Only in dreams my spirit wanders o'er The starry portal of the world of bliss, And lives the life which Fate denies in this, Which may have once been mind, but will be, nevermore.

II.

My Castle stands alone, Away from Earth and Time, In some diviner clime, In Fancy's tropic zone, Beneath its summer skies, Where all the live-long year the summer never dies! A stately marble pile whose pillars rise, From sculptured bases, fluted to the dome, With wreathed friezes crowned, all carven nice With pendant leaves, like ragged rims of foam; A thousand windows front the rising sun, Deep-set between the columns, many paned, Tri-arched, emblazoned, gorgeously stained, Crimson and purple, green and blue, and dun, And all their wedded colors fall below, Like rainbows shattered on a field of snow; A bordering gallery runs along the roof, Topt by a cupola, whose glittering spire Pierces the brooding clouds, a glowing woof, With golden spindles wove in Morning's loom of fire!

III.

What fine and rare domains Untold for leagues around; Green parks, and meads, and plains, And bosky woods profound,— A realm of leafiness, and sweet enchanted ground! Before the palace lies a shaven lawn, Sloping and shining in the dews of dawn, With turfy terraces, and garden bowers, Where rows of slender urns are full of flowers; Broad oaks o'erarch the winding avenues, Edged round with evergreens of fadeless bloom, And pour a thousand intermingling hues, A many tinted flood of golden gloom; Far-seen through twinkling leaves, The fountains gush aloft like silver sheaves, Drooping with shining ears, and crests of spray, And foamy tassels blowing every way, Shaking in marble basins white and cold, A bright and drainless shower of beaded grain, Which winnows off, in sun-illumined rain The dusty chaff, a cloud of misty gold; Around their volumes, down the plashy tide, The swans are sailing mixed in lilies white, Like virgin queens in soft disdain and pride, Sweeping amid their maids with trains of light; A little herd of deer with startled looks, In shady parks where all the year they browse, Head-down are drinking at the lucid brooks, Their antlers mirrored with the tangled boughs; My rivers flow beyond, with guardant ranks Of silver-liveried poplars, on their banks; Barges are fretting at the castle piers, Rocking with every ripple in the tide; And bridges span the stream with arches wide, Their stony 'butments mossed and gray with years; An undulating range of vales, and bowers, And columned palaces, and distant towers, And on the welkin mountains bar the view, Shooting their jagged peaks sublimely up the blue!

IV.

I saunter up the walks; My sandals wetted through With dripping flowers and stalks, That line the avenue; My broidered mantle all bedabbled with the dew! I climb a flight of steps with regal pride, And stroll along an echoing colonnade, Sweeping against its pillared balustrade, Adown a porch, and through a portal wide, And I am in my Castle, Lord of all; My faithful groom is standing in the hall To doff my shining robe, while servitors, And cringing chamberlains beside the doors Waving their gilded wands, obsequious wait, And bow me on my way in royal pomp and state!

V.

My chamber lies apart, The Castle's very heart, And all things rich and rare, From land, and sea, and air, Are lavished with a wild and waste profusion there! The carpeting was woven in Turkish looms, From softest wool of fine Circassian sheep; Tufted like springy moss in forests deep, Illuminate with all its autumn blooms; The antique chairs are made of cedar trees, Veined with the rings of vanished cennturies And touched with winter's frost, and summer's sun; Sofas and couches, stuffed with cygnet's fleece, Loll round inviting dreaminess and ease; The gorgeous window curtains, damask red, Suspended, silver-ringed, on bars of gold, Droop heavily, in many a fluted fold, And, rounding outward, intercept, and shed The prisoned daylight o'er the slumbrous room, In streams of rosy dimness, purple gloom; Hard by are cabinets of curious shells, Twisted and jointed, horned, wreathed, and curled, And some like moons in rosy mist impearled, With coral boughs from ocean's deepest cells; Cases of rare medallions, coins antique, Found in the dust of cities, Roman, Greek; Etruscan urns, transparent, soft, and bright, With fawns and dancing shepherds on their sides; And costly marble vases dug from night In Pompeii, beneath its lava tides: Clusters of arms, the spoil of ancient wars; Old scimitars of true Damascus brand, Short swords with basket hilts to guard the hand, And iron casques with rusty visor bars; Lances, and spears, and battle axes keen, With crescent edges, shields with studded thorns, Yew bows, and shafts, and curved bugle horns, With tasseled baldricks of the Lincoln green: And on the walls with lifted curtains, see! The portraits of my noble ancestry; Thin featured, stately dames with powdered locks, And courtly shepherdesses tending flocks; Stiff lords in wigs, and ruffles white as snow, Haught peers, and princes centuries ago, And dark Sir Hugh, the bravest of the line, With all the knightly scars he won in Palestine!

VI.

My gallery sleeps aloof, Soft-lighted through the roof, Enshrining pictures old, And groups of statues cold, The gems of Art, when Art was in her Age of Gold! Not picked from any single age or clime, Nor one peculiar master, school, or tone; Select of all, the best of all alone, The spoil and largesse of the Earth and Time; Food for all thoughts and fancies, grave or gay; Suggestive of old lore, and poets' themes; These filled with shapes of waking life, and day, And those with spirits and the world of dreams; Let me draw back the curtains, one by one, And give their muffled brightness to the sun:

THE PICTURES.

Helen and Paris on their bridal night, Under the swinging cressets' starry light, With Priam and his fifty sons around, Feasting in all their majesty and bloom,

Filling their golden cups with eager hands, To drink a health, while pale Cassandra stands With all her raven tresses unbound, Her soul o'ershadowed by the coming doom.

Andromache, with all her tearful charms, Folded upon the mighty Hector's breast, And the babe shrinking in its Nurse's arms, Affrightened by the nodding of his crest.

The giant Cyclops, sitting in his cave, Helped by the diving Ulysses, old and wise, Spilling the wine in rivers down his beard, Shaggy and grim,—his shoulder overleered By swart Silenus, sly and cunning knave, Who steals a puffy skin with twinkling eyes.

Anacreon, lolling in the myrtle shades, Bibbing his Teian draughts with rich delight, Pledging the dancing girls and Cyprian maids, Pinching their little ears, and shoulders white.

A cloudless sunrise on the glittering Nile, A bronzed Sphinx, and temple on the shore, And robed priests that toss their censers while Abased in dust, the populace adore;

A beaked galley fretting at its curb, With reedy oars, and masts, and silken sails, And Cleopatra walks the deck superb, Slow-followed by her court in spangled veils.

The Virgin Mother, and the Holy Child, Holding a globe and sceptre, sweet and mild; The Magi bring their gifts with reverent looks, And the rapt Shepherds lean upon their crooks.

A summer fete, a party on a lawn; Bowing gallants, with plumed caps in hand, And ladies with guitars, and, far withdrawn, The rustic people dancing in a band.

A bleak defile, a pass in mountains deep, Whose whitened summits wear their morning glow, And dark banditti winding down the steep Of shelvy rocks, pointing their guns below.

A harvest scene, a vineyard on the Rhine; Arbors, and wreathed pales, and laughing swains Pouring their crowded baskets into wains, And vats, and trodden presses gushing wine.

A Flemish Tavern: boors and burghers hale Drawn round a table, o'er a board of chess, Smoking their heavy pipes, and drinking ale, Blowing from tankard brims the frothiness.

A picture of Cathay, a justice scene; Pagodas, statues, and a group around; And, in his sedan chair, the Mandarin, Reading the scroll of laws to prisoners bound, Bambooed with canes, and writhing on the ground; And many more whose veils I will undraw Some other day, exceeding fresh and fine; And statues of the Grecian gods divine, In all their various moods of love and awe: The Phidean Jove, with calm creative face, Like Heaven brooding o'er the deeps of Space; Imperial Juno, Mercury, winged-heeled, Lit with a message. Mars with helm and shield, Apollo with the discus, bent to throw, The piping Pan, and Dian with her bow, And Cytherca just risen from the swell Of crudded foam, half-stooping on her knee, Wringing her dripping tresses in the sea Whose loving billows climb the curved shell Tumultuously, and o'er its edges flow, And kiss with pallid lips her nakedness of snow!

VII.

My boots may lie and mould, However rare and old; I cannot read to-day, Away! with books, away! Full-fed with sweets of sense, I sink upon my couch in honied indolence! Here are rich salvers full of nectarines, Dead-ripe pomegranates, sweet Arabian dates, Peaches and plums, and clusters fresh from vines, And all imaginable sweets, and cakes, And here are drinking-cups, and long-necked flasks In wicker mail, and bottles broached from casks, In cellars delved deep, and winter cold, Select, superlative, and centuries old. What more can I desire? what book can be As rich as Idleness and Luxury? What lore can fill my heart with joy divine, Like luscious fruitage, and enchanted wine? Brimming with Helicon I dash the cup; Why should I waste my years in hoarding up The thoughts of eld? Let dust to dust return: No more for me,—my heart is not an urn! I will no longer sip from little flasks, Covered with damp and mould, when Nature yields, And Earth is full of purple vintage fields; Nor peer at Beauty dimmed with mortal masks, When I at will may have them all withdrawn, And freely gaze in her transfigured face; Nor limp in fetters in a weary race, When I may fly unbound, like Mercury's fawn; No more contented with the sweets of old, Albeit embalmed in nectar, since the trees, The Eden bowers, the rich Hesperides, Droop all around my path, with living fruits of gold!

VIII.

Oh what a life is mine, A life of joy and mirth, The sensuous life of Earth, Forever fresh and fine. A heavenly worldliness, mortality divine! When eastern skies, the sea, and misty plain, Illumined slowly, doff their nightly shrouds, And Heaven's bright archer Morn begins to rain His golden arrows through the banded clouds, I rise and tramp away the jocund hours, Knee-deep in dewy grass, and beds of flowers; I race my eager greyhound on the hills, And climb with bounding feet the craggy steeps, Peak-lifted, gazing down the cloven deeps, Where mighty rivers shrink to threaded rills; The ramparts of the mountains loom around, Like splintery fragments of a ruined world; The cliff-bound dashing cataracts, downward hurled In thunderous volumes, shake the chasms profound: The imperial eagle, with a dauntless eye Wheels round the sun, the monarch of the sky; I pluck his eyrie in the blasted wood Of ragged pines, and when the vulture screams, I track his flight along the solitude, Like some dark spirit in the world of dreams! When Noon in golden armor, travel spent, Climbing the azure plains of Heaven, alone, Pitches upon its topmost steep his tent, And looks o'er Nature from his burning throne, I loose my little shallop from its quay, And down the winding rivers slowly float, And steer in many a shady cove and bay, Where birds are warbling with melodious note; I listen to the humming of the bees, The water's flow, the winds, the wavy trees, And take my lute and touch its silver chords, And set the Summer's melody to words; Sometimes I rove beside the lonely shore, Margined and flanked by slanting shelvy ledges, And caverns echoing Ocean's sullen roar; Threading the bladdery weeds, and paven shells, Beyond the line of foam, the jewelled chain, The largesse of the ever giving main. Tossed at the feet of Earth with surgy swells, I plunge into the waves, and strike away, Breasting with vigorous strokes the snowy spray; Sometimes I lounge in arbors hung with vines, The which I sip, and sip, with pleasure mute, O'er mouthful bites of golden-rinded fruit; When evening comes, I lie in dreamy rest, Where lifted casements front the glowing west, And watch the clouds, like banners wide unfurled, Hung o'er the flaming threshold of the world: Its mission done, the holy Day recedes, Borne Heavenward in its car, with fiery steeds, Leaving behind a lingering flush of light, Its mantle fallen at the feet of Night; The flocks are penned, the earth is growing dim; The moon comes rounding up the welkin's rim, Glowing through thinnest mist, an argent shell, Washed up the sky from Night's profoundest cell; One after one the stars begin to shine In drifted beds, like pearls through shallow brine; And lo! through clouds that part before the chase Of silent winds—a belt of milky white, The Galaxy, a crested surge of light, A reef of worlds along the sea of Space: I hear my sweet musicians far withdrawn, Below my wreathed lattice, on the lawn, With harp, and lute, and lyre, And passionate voices full of tears and fire; And envious nightingales with rich disdain Filling the pauses of the languid strain; My soul is tranced and bound, Drifting along the magic sea of sound, Driving in a barque of bliss from deep to deep, And piloted at last into the ports of Sleep!

IX.

Nor only this, though this Might seal a life of bliss, But something more divine, For which I once did pine, The crown of worlds above, The heart of every heart, the Soul of Being—Love! I bow obedient to my Lady's sway, The sovereignty that won my soul of yore, And linger in her presence night and day, And feel a heaven around her evermore; I sit beside her couch in chambers lone, And soft unbraid, and lay her locks apart, And take her taper fingers in my own, And press them to my lips with leaps of heart; Sometimes I kneel to her with cups of wine, With pleading eyes, beseeching her to taste, With long-delaying lips, the draught divine; And when she sips thereof, I clasp her waist, And kiss her mouth, and shake her hanging curls, And in her coy despite unloose her zone of pearls! I live for Love, for Love alone, and who Dare chide me for it? who dare call it folly? It is a holy thing, if aught is holy, And true indeed, if Truth herself is true: Earth cleaves to earth, its sensuous life is dear, Mortals should love mortality while here, And seize the glowing hours before they fly: Bright eyes should answer eyes, warm lips should meet, And hearts enlocked to kindred hearts should beat, And every soul that lives, in love should live and die!

X.

My dear and gentle wife, The Angel of my life, Oppressed with sweetest things, Has folded up her wings, And lies in slumber deep, Like some divinest Dream upon the couch of Sleep!

Nor sound, nor stir profanes the stilly room, Haunted by Sleep and Silence, linked pair; The very light itself muffled in gloom, Steals in, and melts the enamored air Where Love doth brood and dream, while Passion dies, Breathing his soul out in a mist of sighs! Lo! where she lies behind the curtains white, Pillowed on clouds of down,—her golden hair Braided around her forehead smooth and fair, Like a celestial diadem of light:— Her soft voluptuous lips are drawn apart, Curving in fine repose, and maiden pride; Her creamy breast,—its mantle brushed aside Swells with the long pulsation of her heart: One languid arm rests on the coverlid, And one beneath the crumpled sheet is hid, (Ah happy sheets! to hide an arm so sweet!) Nor all concealed amid their folds of snow, The soft perfection of her shape below, Rounded and tapering to her little feet! Oh Love! if Beauty ever left her sphere, And sovereign sisters, Art and Poesy, Moulded in loveliness she slumbers here, Slumbers, dear love, in thee! It is thy smile that makes the chamber still; It is thy breath that fills the scented air; The light around is borrowed from thy hair, And all things else are subject to thy will, And I am so bewildered in this deep Ambrosial calm, and passionate atmosphere, I know not whether I am dreaming here, Or in the world of Sleep!

XI.

My eyes are full of tears, My heart is full of pain, To wake, as now, again, And walk, as in my youth, the wilderness of Years! No more! no more! the autumn winds are loud In stormy passes, howling to the Night: Behind a cloud the moon doth veil her light, And the rain pours from out the horned cloud. And hark! the solemn and mysterious bell, Swinging its brazen echoes o'er the wave: Not mortal hands, but spirits ring the knell, And toll the parting ghost of Midnight to its grave.

TO A BEREAVED MOTHER.

BY HERMANN.

Its smile and happy laugh are lost to thee, Earth must his mother and his pillow be.

W. G. CLARK.

Mother, now thy task is done, Now thy vigil ended; With the coming of the sun, Grief and joy are blended.

Grief that thus thy flower of love From its stem is riven; Joy that will bloom above, Midst the bowers of Heaven.

Gone, as oft expires the light Of thy nightly taper: Gone, as 'fore the sunshine bright, Early morning's vapor.

Kiss its lips so mute and cold, Cold as chiselled marble, They will now to harp of gold Glad Hosannas warble.

At the last they sweetly smiled, Told it not for gladness; Would'st thou now recall thy child To a world of sadness?

It is hard to gather up, Ties so rudely riven; But thou'lt find this bitter cup For thy weal was given.

Kiss again its hands so white, Kiss its marble forehead; Soon the grave will hide from sight, That thou only borrowed.

Thou will meet thy child again, Where no death or sorrow Bring their sad to-day of pain, And their dread to-morrow.

FOOTNOTES:

[L] This poem, in an unfinished form, was published some months ago in Sartain's Magazine. It has since been re-written for the International, and is now much more than before deserving of the applause with which it was received.



THE AMBITIOUS BROOKLET.

BY A. OAKEY HALL.

CHAPTER I.

How the Brooklet was born; and lodged; and wandered off one rainy day.

There was once a Brooklet born of a modest spring that circled through a smiling meadow. All the hours of the Spring, and the Summer, and the Autumn, kept she her musical round; greeting the sun at his rising, together with the meadow-larks which came to dip their beaks in the sparkling water-drops; and singing to the moon and stars all night, as she bore their features within her bosom, in grateful remembrance of their beauty. The laborer in the field hard by often came to visit her, and wet his honest, toil-browned brow with her cooling drops; and often, too, the laborer's daughter came at sunset time to sit by a mossy stone, with so lovely a face that the Brooklet, as she mirrored the features of the beautiful visitor, leaped about the pebbles with ripplings of admiration.

And so this Brooklet lived on, only ceasing her merry flow and circling journey when the bushes by her side became white with snow, and when the rabbits from the brushwood fence at her head came out to stand upon the slippery casing that the Brooklet often saw spreading over her, and shutting out the warm sunshine by day, and at nightfall blurring the radiance of moon and stars.

One stormy spring day the Brooklet seemed to rise higher among the twigs of the alder-bushes than ever before; the rain came down faster and heavier, and beat into her bosom, until her tiny waves were rough and sore with pain, and she was fain to nestle closer to the sedgy grass that now bent lowly to the pebbles at the roots. Growing higher every minute was the Brooklet; and frightened somewhat, and longing for the sunlight, or the laborer, and for the lovely daughter's face to cheer her up, she looked off over a track of country wider and greener than she had ever seen before. And so the Brooklet, all frightened as she was, said to herself, "I'll run along a bit into this country spot, so wide and green, and maybe I shall find the sunlight and the lovely face."

Faster came the rain; and so the Brooklet, leaping wildly over a rock whose top until then her eyes had never seen, went flowing on upon this country spot, so wide and green. The new sights coming in view at every bound quite made the Brooklet forget her terrors from the beating rain; she was pained no longer by the heavy drops, but soothed herself among the velvet grass; and turned between little flowers scarcely above the ground, and which, as she passed them, seemed to be as frightened by the wind and rain as herself had been before the meadow was left behind.

The Brooklet had thus run on until she saw the country spot so wide and green was well passed over, and trees and bushes, darker and thicker than she had ever known before, were close at hand. And while she thought of stopping in her way and going back, she heard not far before an echo of a sound most like unto her own; and so kept on to find it out. Clearer and louder increased the sound, as now through mouldy leaves and dark thickets, and under decayed logs and insect-burrowed moss, she kept a course, until presently, over a fallen tree, she saw a Brooklet, larger, wider, and evidently much older than herself, which, on her near approach, ran by the fallen tree's side, and said, "Good morning, sister: what is so delicate a being, as you seem to be, doing in this dark forest?"

The wanderer Brooklet became silent with wonder. She had never been addressed before, though often trying to talk with the laborer, and to the lovely face of her meadow acquaintance, without the slightest notice upon their part of the overtures.

"Good morning, sister, I say," was repeated over the fallen tree. "Where are you going at so slow a pace? Come over, and let us talk a bit."

"I cannot, for I am terribly frightened, and I've lost my way. I want to quit this dark place, and go where I can hear the lark again, and see the pretty face which used to look at mine when I was circling in yonder meadow, now, I fear, far, far behind."

"Larks and pretty faces, indeed! Why what a spooney sister, you are, to be sure. I'll show you more birds than ever you heard sing before, and prettier faces than ever you saw before."

"No, no, I must go back," replied the wanderer; "I have come too far already, and see, the rain has almost ceased."

"More's the pity for that," returned the other; "the faster it rains the faster I go, and that is what I want. I have left my family brooks a long time since, and I'm going on my travels to be somebody. I'm tired of my lonesome life among the meadows. I'm the ambitious Brooklet. Come over, then, and go along; we'll travel the faster in company."

"I'm not ambitious; and as you may see, I cannot come."

"You're almost to the log top now. I'll kiss you soon," triumphed the ambitious Brooklet, circling gayly round a tuft of green.

It must have been the terrible rain, or the fright of her dark journeying place, that had taken her strength away:—the wandering Brooklet felt that it must be: for now her strength of will was almost gone. Nearer the log top came in view, until with a bound she swept its polished surface, and with a dash came over upon the ambitious Brooklet.

"Good! that's the way to do it; now we shall journey gayly on," said the latter, "I have lost much time in stopping here, and there are such rare sights ahead!"

The wanderer felt the oddest sensations she had ever known, and said, "Sister—ambitious sister—how much warmer than I are you!"

"Oh, you are young, I suppose—fresh from the icy spring. But journey on more southward yet, away from these dark trees, and you'll be warmer yet; come, I say."

"I like your feel; but then I shall be lost, I know I shall; and so I'll stay behind."

"You cannot; for, ambitious as I am, I want your help. See how much faster we travel together when your strength is joined to mine; and I'm the strongest, and you can't go back."

The wandering Brooklet looked fearfully around, and saw indeed that the log she had leaped was now fast fading away, and felt that her strength became less and less as the ambitious Brooklet clung closer to her side.

Presently they came in sight of a ledge of rocks. "Oh, this is rare indeed!" said the stronger sister Brooklet, "Let us pause a bit for breath, and then for a merry leap adown the valley of pines you see before."

The Brooklets stopped, and became stronger, and leaped over the rocks; the one with an exulting bound—the other carried tremblingly along.

The leap was a long one, and a hard one; for there were craggy rocks beneath, which they had not seen. And the ambitious Brooklet cried sharply and loudly—foaming in her rage as she went between the stony points, and quite forgetting her weaker sister in her pain. The latter was sorely injured too, and cut into little foam-bits; but she kept her wits about her, looking around everywhere for a place to rest. Soon she espied one—a little bowl of marshy ground, hemmed in by rocks, into which a straggling dropping from the chasm above slowly came.

"Here will I go and rest," she said. So waiting for the ambitious Brooklet to get far out of sight, she collected all her strength for a jump into the bowl, where the drops came sparkling in. There was no need for fear of the sister on before; her she heard going over rock after rock, crying and wailing in her craggy journey. Then the tired wanderer, with a violent effort of her exhausted strength, jumped a rock and fell panting into the marshy bowl.

CHAPTER II.

How the Brooklet lived on in her new quarters; and how misfortune made her discontented.

The dropping of the water from the rocks above her new abode, was cold and grateful to the Brooklet in her fevered state. It made her think of the spring she came from; and so of the meadow; and the alder-bushes; and the lovely face a weary way off now she knew, and fenced away from her return by cruel jagged rocks.

Days passed by; and the sun came out all brightly. And the moon and stars were seen again; and larger and sweeter birds than she had heard before, now perched upon the trees about, warbling and chirruping from day-break to twilight. So the time passed on. The wanderer began to feel unsettled in her solitude. But there was no return by the path she came; still were the sharp rocks seen above; and still she felt a twinge of pain when thinking of her weary journey on that rainy day. Often too she thought of her ambitious sister, wondering where she was now and what she was about; and sometimes she almost fancied she would have been happier had she gone along. It was quite evident to herself that she was getting discontented.

There was one pleasure she prized much. Following in the train of the ambitious Brooklet had been a score of fishes, which, frightened by the leap upon the jagged rocks, had staid behind with the timid wanderer, until they became part of her family in the new retreat. Overlooking, and enjoying the gambols of these fish, the discontented Brooklet often amused herself. Observing how when the sun came slanting through the sides of the foliage about, they would dart out from their hiding-places in the old dead leaves at the feet of the Brooklet, and so jump up to greet the warming rays: or how, when a fly fell down from the overhanging boughs, and tried to swim away, they would jump to nab a bit of lunch, scrabbling and tugging as they went; or how, when the largest fish of all threw off his dignity, and played with them at hide and seek under the foot-deep bottom of mud, they would all shoot about her life-blood drops without regard to the angles of pain their fins would leave behind!

Thus the summer-time came on, and was passing by, when one day the Brooklet felt a shadow upon her, and looked up to see the cause—when high upon the rocks above, there stood a bright-eyed boy, with curling locks that blew about in golden beauty with the breeze. In his hand he held a little stick, which he turned over from time to time, and would take up and then lay it down, as if preparing for something wonderful. The curiosity of the Brooklet was aroused to know what he could mean, when presently she saw him sit upon the rock, and from the stick drop down upon her face a worm, which when the fishes saw they darted out to eat.

"It is a beautiful boy; and a kind boy," said the artless Brook unto herself; "and he has come to feed the little fishes with a worm. I have not seen one since I left my little meadow on that rainy day. How like the lovely face I used to see, is his which now looks down."

While thus the Brook was soliloquizing, a fish more cunning than the rest, had seized the worm within his mouth, and was swimming away to his favorite hole by an old willow stump to there complete a meal. He was just entering it, when the Brook saw him suddenly flash from her embrace, floundering and pulling as he went up, up through the air, unto the mossy bank above the rock from which fell the shadow of the boy. And now the Brook, more curious than ever, saw the face so like the laborer's daughter overspread with smiles as the tiny hands grasped the fish, and with a wrench tore out the worm from his gills, a piece of which fell on the Brook athwart the shadow of the laugher.

"What a fine one!" said the boy, and started up;—started up to slip against a smooth worn stone, and fall over the rock into the Brook, close by the willow stump; the captive fish held tightly as he went, but slipping from the falling grasp into its welcome element once more.

The Brook had never felt so hard a blow before. The rain and hail were nothing to this. It made her splash and leap and swell against the rocky bank, until she could have called with pain.

How still the boy laid on her breast! his head against the willow stump, over which there trickled a tiny purple stream smaller than the spring-drops from the rock! How richly his golden locks floated upon the Brook! but how widely strained his bright blue eyes glaring at the sky and tree-tops above, and how he gasped from his mouth; a mouth so like the one the laborer had often prest in harvest-time to the Brook, when it was yet circling in the meadow! The Brook said to herself, "I will put some of my ripples into this mouth, as I have seen the laborer do; perhaps, like him, it will make his eye sparkle, and send him away again; for he lies heavy on my breast." And so the ripples went into the opened mouth by dozens; but the blue sky and tree-tops faded from his eyes, and the lips lost their bright color, and the purple trickling on the willow stump grew thick and settled into a dark pool.

All night the dead boy lay upon the breast of the Brook; and the fishes played around him, wondering what it was; and the little insects hopped over him at early sunlight; until the purple pool dried up, and only left a stain behind.

And soon the Brook heard the hum of voices sounding over the rocks, as she listened from her solitude; and soon more shadows fell upon her face. Then looking up she saw the laborer once again; and the Brook rejoiced to think perhaps she was going back again into her pleasant meadow. He had taken up the stick the boy had used; and was looking down below upon the Brook, as the face—the lovely face, with more of the old sorrow in it—of the laborer's daughter, raised itself above his shoulder.

"My brother!—drowned and dead!—and no more to come home alive to share his sister's home."

This the Brook heard, and the fishes swam away into their holes, as piercing, sorrowful human tones mingled with the passing breeze; and they struck deeper into the willow roots as a pair of brawny arms readied out and caught the dead boy, and carried him away.

The boy was gone, but the stain was there; and still a weight remained upon the Brook. For still day after day a shadow fell upon her, and the Brook looking up beheld the lovely but mournful face of the sorrowing sister, who would sit upon the mossy bank and sigh a sob; kissing a lock of golden hair the while. And heavier grew the weight on the breast of the Brook, as scalding tears fell from the rock above upon her face.

And now the Brook again became discontented: and thought of her ambitious sister; and what might have happened had she followed after on a weary round of travels. The old meadow and the alders were out of the question now: for the winter was coming on, and the laborer and the lovely face would no more come to her side; and if they did they would sing no more, but sigh and sob, and look so sad, as now, upon the mossy rock above.

The summer weather was long over; and the leaves were showering down, and had quite hidden the clouds and blue sky, and moon and stars from the sight of the Brook. The birds had ceased to sit and warble on the trees above. The breezes ceased their music, and instead were heard the hoarse notes of the Autumn wind.

CHAPTER III.

How the Brooklet and the Mountain-Torrent met.

One day the leaves thickened more than ever over the Brook, and, as she peeped between, she saw the clouds were heavier and darker than usual. The wind roared louder, and the trees which grew so high above her bent down their branches until they brushed her face with their trailing. And soon the rain began to fall in torrents; and it fell and fell all day; all night too. Then the Brook rejoiced to think the leaves which she had been angry with before for choking her, protected from the pattering strokes. And soon the Brook heard a sound, like that made by her ambitious sister in the spring-time;—nearer and nearer it came; through the trees; over the rocks; tearing, splashing, dashing, and foaming at a direful rate.

"It is my ambitious sister come for me. I'm glad," said the discontented Brook.

"Glad of what?" exclaimed a roaring voice, coming over the rock, and sweeping away the leaves as if they had been a mere handful; and covering up the ugly purple stain upon the willow stump. "Ain't I a famous fellow, though? When once my blood is up, can't I go on and frighten people? Can't I mine out the earth, and sweep along big trees like boats? Can't I tumble down the rocks that dare to stop my path? Can't I drown men and boys, and all the cattle in the land? I've swallowed a dozen haystacks for my breakfast, and killed the finest mill-dam over the world this morning. I said I would as soon as winter came, when they dammed me up last spring, so many miles away! Oh, such a mass of stone and timber which they put up to fret me in my path; and what a joke to think this solid mass is scattered through the land since yesternight, and I am free once more."

"This is not my ambitious sister! no indeed," murmured the Brook.

"Why here is a little Brook," continued the voice, "a dainty, prudish, modest Brook, collected in a hole to die! Come out, my fair one! I will wed thee, as I have wedded fifty thousand of your sex in my short day! Come out; no fear; if I am the Mountain-Torrent, I'm not so great a monster as they say, especially to hurt a modest Brook."

So saying the Mountain-Torrent caught up the shrinking Brook in his powerful embrace, and away they hurried through the very heart of the forest, miles and miles below.

"This, this is life indeed," said the wedded Brook, once more a wanderer over the land, as with a thousand other Brooks they travelled on for many hours with impetuous speed, making dreadful havoc everywhere they touched. Havoc among the farmers and the villagers, who fought them inch by inch, with sticks and trees, and mounds of stone and clay, all which they licked up and swallowed, as if they had been pebbles and clumps of leaves. Havoc with the Creeks upon the route, who dared to scorn their overtures, and wed the Torrent, willingly; for spurning the placid, humble Creeks one side, they tore along their paths, and vented their fury on the bridges overhead, bringing down in general destruction, turnpikes and railroads with their pressing weight of travel.

Havoc to themselves!

For, tearing on so madly, the Mountain-Torrent, after a while, perceived his strength to fail, and his endurance to give out. But still he hurried on, though feebly, in hopes to meet more Brooks, perhaps a Lake, and so recruit himself the while. The wedded Brook was wearied too—a little; not much; at first the Mountain-Torrent had held her tightly in embrace, and carried her along with scarcely an effort; but as he wearied himself, much of the toil was thrown upon the Brook, and she was compelled to help herself. On went the Torrent, weaker every step, until at last he stopped and said:

"Oh wedded Brook! my strength is gone; here must I pause; but you go on. Perhaps before long I shall meet you again. Go slowly; over the meadows and through the villages make me a path; I'll know which way you went."

And so they parted; and so the lonely Brook meandered on, and finding out a bubbling spring, was well recruited for the journey. As she went she heard, across a little knoll, a remembered voice, and stopped. "I know you, sister Brook," cried out the voice, "go on a bit and turn towards your left, and there I'll meet you."

And towards the left the lonely Brook met her ambitious sister. She was violent no more; but sober and sedate; calm as the evening sky reflected from her face.

"I'm the 'ambitious one,'" said she, "ambitious yet, though all my strength has departed. Here on this spot was I caught and fastened up. They darkened my daylight with that smoking monster yonder, and killed my peace of mind with such a horrid din and clang, I've not a morsel of energy left. I'm a factory slave; and so are you, too, for that matter, now! Don't start; it's not my fault—the way that you were going on, you would have brought up in the Pond below, where there is yet another smoking monster; only worse than this of mine. The Pond there is a horrid fellow; poisoning with some horrid purple dye: I've seen him often when I venture near the dam and look below."

"Sister, take courage," cried the other Brook. "I'm glad I met you. I'm ambitious too, for I was lately wedded to a glorious fellow, and have been on such a glorious tour: scampering over all the land. He calls himself the 'Mountain-Torrent.' He is now behind a mile or so, and may be down upon us before long, to free us from this distressing imprisonment you speak of."

The monster smoked on; and the clanging din about maddened all the air. Huge wheels went racking and rumbling under huge brick walls. And day by day, a minute at a time, some youthful faces, pale and shadowy, looked wistfully upon the landscape below. But little knew the monster, and the clanging din, and racking wheels; and little hoped the shadowy faces of what the Brooklets plotted at the very factory door.

CHAPTER IV.

How the Mountain-Torrent freed the Brooks; and their fate.

The frost dropped on the Brooks, and once more blurred the moon and stars, and shut the sunlight out; and starred a thousand jewels on the mill-dam's brow; and sparkled a myriad icicles from the rumbling wheels. Far away into the country it spread a white mantle, and froze into the very heart of all the Ponds and Creeks above. And then the sun came out and shone so brightly; and then the clouds over-covered it, and the rain came pattering down as of the olden time, when first its peltings stung the meadow Brook and tempted her to roam. And higher swelled the Brooks behind their mill-dam prison, and sent more of their life-blood to refresh the poisoned Pond below.

"I am getting stronger; I am very strong to-day, sister Brook," said the ambitious one. "I think that with our efforts now united, we can push this mill-dam over and escape."

"Wait for my darling Mountain-Torrent. I hear him on his way; he follows after us. And see down yonder hill-side how he tears along; and hark! how gladly, as he sees us from his rocky bed, he roars a song of courage."

And the sister Brooks triumphed together as they saw the keepers of the smoking monster cease their clanging din, and rush for timbers to uphold the dam; and fly about with tools that were but baby toys for what was coming now.

"Bring trees; bring stones; bring every thing," cried out the Brooks, as they saw the Mountain-Torrent come rushing nearer on, sweeping away the fences, and ploughing out a path more fitting for his travels than the brookside one he kept in view.

"Welcome, my fair ones," roared he, as with heavy timbers in his maw he caught the Brooks again in strong embrace, and dashing at the smoking monster, knocked him down at once. Down came the mill-dam with an earthquake noise; the din upon the air was not of clanging tools and hammer stroke; the wheels were racking and rumbling, not beneath brick walls, but over the rocks and ruined factories below; while the pale and shadowy faces looked no longer wistfully on the landscape, but madly rushed about to spread the tale of ruin through the land.

The same old thing! The same old journey over the country. The same old havoc as they went. But the strength of a thousand Brooks seemed given to the Mountain-Torrent as, looking miles away, he saw a wide expanse of water fringed with brown and bluish lines. "It is the Ocean, fair ones," cried he; "when your feeble sights shall see it, bless my power, for at length we reach a home no art of man can invade to fetter us or bind us down. Ten millions of our species mingle there; in small harmony it is true, but better fight among ourselves than ever thus to wage a war with man. Now too approaches the time of our revenge: we'll take his life; we'll sink his ships; we'll break his boasted wealth into uncounted atoms, and scatter it."

The Brooks trembled in the strong grasp of the Mountain-Torrent to hear the vehemence with which he spoke these threatening words; but lost their fears in greater astonishment, as now they neared the ocean waste, fringed with the lines of brown and blue of which he spoke.

"Why, sister, what a noise!" cried one of the Brooks, "our own is not to be heard."

"See what a dreadful wall appears to rise and fall as we approach," answered the other. And they both clung closer to the embrace of the Torrent as he crossed the beach they reached at last, and plunged, with sticks and stones and all, upon the wall of foam and sand, which parted as the Mountain-Torrent and the Brooks joined forces with old Ocean's solemn waste.

In an instant the meadow-born Brook writhed in pain, pressed on by thousands of Mountain-Torrents every way at once. She foamed and fought, and fought and foamed; under and over, up and below she plunged, but no escape; one weary work for ages yet to come!

"Revenge once more! Gather and rage! Dash to ruin ships and sailors!" growled a tone which made the writhing Brook tremble into a million foam-beads, as simultaneously a roaring Tempest clattered by with thunder and lightning in its train, while a clashing hiss, as of something rushing madly through the water, bade the Brook—the sea-slave Brook—look up.

No time for thought; for still the tone was heard, "Revenge once more! gather and rage! dash to ruin ship and sailors!" And still the tempest clattered, and still the hissing of the gallant ship's prow was heard cleaving the maddened waves. On, on! a dash; a crash; a march of maddening waves; a stunning tempest howl, and then the hiss was heard no more. But far and wide were hurried and mashed in one chaotic mass the fragments of the gallant ship.

"How wise he is; how true my Mountain-Torrent spoke," thought the frightened sea-slave Brook, as the clattering tempest, with thunder and lightning in its train, passed out of sight and hearing leagues beyond. "And now I'll rest me on this sandy beach, for this ambitious life is wearisome indeed."

And she nestled closely to a rock, and so crept into grateful rest. But as she lay, she looked beyond her sandy bed to see the lovely face of her early meadow life, when she was but a humble Brook. Pale and ghastly it lay upon a rounded stone; the hair floating out like fairy circles from the marked brow, and on the temple such a purple thickened stain as once had been upon the willow stump.

The Brook came by her side and watched her gently as she lay. Then going farther out, the Brook brought strings of sea-weed, and strung them gayly and softly round her form, and watched her thus again. "Here will I stay," thought the Brook, "and fancy I am still in the sunlight meadow before I wandered forth into ambitious company. There's nought but trouble and pain crossed my path since the rainy days of the latest spring-time. Here will I stay, and ever mourn that I listened to ambitious counselling."



LAST CASE OF THE SUPERNATURAL.

A writer in the January number of Fraser's Magazine, at the conclusion of a tale crammed with the intensest horrors, presents us with one instance in which the architect of such machinery was foiled.

When the recital was finished, and the company were well-nigh breathless with its skilfully cumulative terror, cried Tremenheere—

"Humph! that is rather an uncomfortable story to go to bed upon."

And presently—

"You have been lately in Spain, Melton; what news from Seville?"

"Oh," replied Melton, "you must have heard of Don Juan de Murana, of terrible memory?"

"Not we," said they.

"One gloomy evening Don Juan de Murana was returning along the quay where the Golden Tower looks down upon the Guadalquivir, so lost in thought that it was some time before he perceived that his cigar had gone out, though he was one of the most determined smokers in Spain. He looked about him, and beheld on the other side of the broad river an individual whose brilliant cigar sparkled like a star of the first magnitude at every aspiration.

"Don Juan, who, thanks to the terror which he had inspired, was accustomed to see all the world obedient to his caprices, shouted to the smoker to come across the river and give him a light.

"The smoker, without taking that trouble, stretched out his arm towards the Don, and so effectually that it traversed the river like a bridge, and presented to Don Juan a glowing cigar, which smelt most abominably of sulphur.

"If Don Juan felt something like a rising shudder, he suppressed it, coolly lighted his own cigar at that of the smoker, and went on his way, singing, Los Toros a la puerta."

"But who was the smoker?"

"Who could he be, but the Prince of Darkness in person, who had laid a wager with Pluto that he would frighten Don Juan De Murana, and went back to his place furious at having lost?

"If you would learn more of Don Juan de Murana, how he went to his own funeral, and died at last in the odor of sanctity, read that most spirited series of letters, De Paris a Cadix, wherein Alexander Dumas has surpassed himself. And now, Good night!"



A STORY WITHOUT A NAME[M]

Written For The International Monthly Magazine

BY G. P. R. JAMES, ESQ.

Continued from Page 348.

CHAPTER XIV.

Occasionally in the life of man, as in the life of the world—History—or in the course of a stream towards the sea, come quiet lapses, sunny and calm, reflecting nothing but the still motionless objects around, or the blue sky and moving clouds above. Often too we find that this tranquil expanse of silent water follows quickly after some more rapid movement, comes close upon some spot where a dashing rapid has diversified the scene, or a cataract, in roar and confusion and sparkling terror, has broken the course of the stream.

Such a still pause, silent of action—if I may use the term—followed the events which I have related in the last chapter, extending over a period of nearly six months. Nothing happened worthy of any minute detail. Peace and tranquillity dwelt in the various households which I have noticed in the course of this story, enlivened in that of Sir Philip Hastings by the gay spirit of Emily Hastings, although somewhat shadowed by the sterner character of her father; and in the household of Mrs. Hazleton brightened by the light of hope, and the fair prospect of success in all her schemes which for a certain time continued to open before her.

Mr. Marlow only spent two days at her house, and then went away to London, but whatever effect her beauty might have produced upon him, his society, brief as it was, served but to confirm her feelings towards him, and before he left her, she had made up her mind fully and entirely, with her characteristic vigor and strength of resolution, that her marriage with Mr. Marlow was an event which must and should be. There was under this conviction, but not the less strong, not the less energetic, not the less vehement, for being concealed even from herself—a resolution that no sacrifice, no fear, no hesitation at any course, should stand in the way of her purpose. She did not anticipate many difficulties certainly; for Mr. Marlow clearly admired her; but the resolution was, that if difficulties should arise, she would overcome them at all cost. Hers was one of those characters of which the world makes its tragedies, having within itself passions too strong and deep to be frequently excited—as the more profound waters which rise into mountains when once in motion require a hurricane to still them—together with that energetic will, that fixed unbending determination, which like the outburst of a torrent from the hills, sweeps away all before it. But let it be ever remembered that her energies were exerted upon herself as well as upon others, not in checking passion, not in limiting desire, but in guarding scrupulously every external appearance, guiding every thought and act with careful art towards its destined object. Mrs. Hazleton suffered Mr. Marlow to be in London more than a month before she followed to conclude the mere matters of business between them. It cost her a great struggle with herself, but in that struggle she was successful, and when at length she went, she had several interviews with him. Circumstances—that great enemy of schemes, was against her. Sometimes lawyers were present at their interviews, sometimes impertinent friends; but Mrs. Hazleton did not much care: she trusted to the time he was speedily about to pass in the country, for the full effect, and in the meantime took care that nothing but the golden side of the shield should be presented to her knight.

The continent was at that time open to Englishmen for a short period, and Mr. Marlow expressed his determination of going to the Court of Versailles for a month or six weeks before he came down to take possession of Hartwell place, everything now having been settled between them in regard to business.

Mrs. Hazleton did not like his determination, yet she did not much fear the result; for Mr. Marlow was preeminently English, and never likely to weal a French woman. Still she resolved that he should see her under another aspect before he went. She was a great favorite of the Court of those days; her station, her wealth, her beauty, and her grace rendered her a brightness and an ornament wherever she came. She was invited to one of the more private though not less splendid assemblies at the Palace, and she contrived that Mr. Marlow should be invited also, though neither by nature or habit a courtier. She obtained the invitation for him skilfully, saying to the Royal Personage of whom she asked it, that as he won a lawsuit against her, she wished to show him that she bore no malice. He went, and found her the brightest in the brilliant scene; the great and the proud, the handsome and the gay, all bending down and worshipping, all striving for a smile, and obtaining it but scantily. She smiled upon him, however, not sufficiently to attract remark from others, but quite sufficiently to mark a strong distinction for his own eyes, if he had chosen to use them. He went away to France, and Mrs. Hazleton returned to the country; the winter passed with her in arranging his house for him; and, in so doing, she often had to write to him. His replies were always prompt, kind, and grateful; and at length came the spring, and the pleasant tidings that he was on his way back to his beloved England.

Alas for human expectation! Alas for the gay day-dream of youth—maturity—middle age—old age—for they have all their daydreams! Every passion which besets man from the cradle to the grave has its own visionary expectations. Each creature, each animal, from the tiger to the beetle, has its besetting insect, which preys upon it, gnaws it, irritates it, and so have all the ages of the soul and of the heart. Alas for human speculation of all kinds! Alas for every hope and aspiration! for those that are pure and high, but, growing out of earth, bear within themselves the bitter seeds of disappointment; and those that are dark or low produce the germ of the most poisonous hybrid, where disappointment is united with remorse.

Happy is the man that expecteth nothing, for verily he shall not be disappointed! It is a quaint old saying; and could philosophy ever stem the course of God's will, it would be one which, well followed, might secure to man some greater portion of mortal peace than he possesses. But to aspire was the ordinance of God; and, viewed rightly, the withering of the flowers upon each footstep we have taken upwards, is no discouragement; for if we shape our path aright, there is a wreath of bright blossoms crowning each craggy peak before us, as we ascend to snatch the garland of immortal glory, placed just beyond the last awful leap of death.

Mrs. Hazleton's aspirations, however, were all earthly. She thought of little beyond this life. She had never been taught so to think. There are some who are led astray from the path of noble daring, to others as difficult and more intricate, by some loud shout of passion on the right or on the left—and seek in vain to return; some who, misled by an apparent similarity in the course of two paths, although the finger post says, "Thus shalt thou go!" think that the way so plainly beaten, and so seemingly easy, must surely lead them to the same point. Others again never learn to read the right path from the wrong (and she was one), while others shut their eyes to all direction, fix their gaze upon the summit, and strain up, now amidst flowers and now amidst thorns, till they are cast back from the face of some steep precipice, to perish in the descent or at the foot.

Mrs. Hazleton's aspirations were all earthly; and that was the secret of her only want in beauty. That divine form, that resplendent face, beamed with every earthly grace: sparkled forth mind and intellect in every glance, but they were wanting in soul, in spirit, and in heart. Life was there, but the life of life, the intense flame of immortal, over-earthly intelligence, was wanting. She might be the grandest animal that ever was seen, the most bright and capable intellect that ever dealt with mortal things; but the fine golden chain which leads on the electric fire from intellectual eminence to spiritual preeminence, from mind to soul, from earth to heaven, was wanting, or had been broken. Her loveliness none could doubt, her charm of manner none could deny, her intellectual superiority all admitted, her womanly softness added a grace beyond them all; but there was one grace wanting—the grace of a high, holy soul, which, in those who have it, be they fair, be they ugly, pours forth as an emanation from every look and every action, and surrounds them with a cloud of radiance, faintly imaged by the artist's glory round a saint.

Alas for human aspirations! Alas for the expectations of this fair frail creature! How eagerly she thought of Mr. Marlow's return! how she had anticipated their meeting again! How she had calculated upon all that would be said and done during the next few weeks! The first news she received was that he had arrived, and with a few servants had taken possession of his new dwelling. She remained all day in her own house; she ordered no carriage; she took no walk: she tried to read; she played upon various instruments of music; she thought each instant he would come, at least for a few minutes, to thank her for all the care she had bestowed to make his habitation comfortable. The sun gilded the west; the melancholy moon rose up in solemn splendor; the hours passed by, and he came not.