This incompleteness, we think, will be regretted by all the parties most deeply interested, as well as by the public generally. Mr. Webster does not often repeat himself, and no man who has said or written so much has said or written so little that is undeserving a place in literature or in history. The next paragraph introduces us to Mr. Webster's birthplace, and to his father:

"The interval between the peace of 1763 and the breaking out of the war of the Revolution, was one of excitement and anxiety throughout the Colonies. The great political questions of the day were not only discussed in the towns and cities, but in the villages and hamlets. Captain Webster took a deep interest in those discussions. Like so many of the officers and soldiers of the former war, he obeyed the first call to arms in the new struggle. He commanded a company chiefly composed of his own townspeople, friends, and kindred, who followed him through the greater portion of the war. He was at the battle of White Plains, and was at West Point when the treason of Arnold was discovered. He acted as a Major under Stark at Bennington, and contributed his share to the success of that eventful day. In the last year of the Revolutionary war on the 18th of January, 1782, Daniel Webster was born, in the home which his father had established on the outskirts of civilization. If the character and situation of the place, and the circumstances under which he passed the first year of his life, might seem adverse to the early cultivation of his extraordinary talent, it still cannot be doubted that they possessed influences favorable to elevation and strength of character. The hardships of an infant settlement and border life, the traditions of a long series of Indian wars, and of two mighty national contests, in which an honored parent had borne his part, the anecdotes of Fort William Henry, of Quebec, of Bennington, of West Point, of Wolfe, and Stark, and Washington, the great Iliad and Odyssey of American Independence,—this was the fireside entertainment of the long winter evenings of the secluded village home. Abroad, the uninviting landscape, the harsh and craggy outlines of the hills broken and relieved only by the funereal hemlock and the 'cloud-seeking' pine, the lowlands traversed in every direction by unbridged streams, the tall, charred trunks in the cornfields, that told how stern had been the struggle with the boundless woods, and, at the close of the year, the dismal scene which presents itself in high latitudes in a thinly settled region, when

'The snows descend; and, foul and fierce, All winter drives along the darkened air'—

these are circumstances to leave an abiding impression on the mind of a thoughtful child, and induce an early maturity of character."

Of his early professional life, and of some of his contemporaries, Mr. Everett says:

"Immediately on his admission to the bar, Mr. Webster went to Amherst, in New Hampshire, where his father's court was in session; from that place he went home with his father. He had intended to establish himself at Portsmouth, which, as the largest town and the seat of the foreign commerce of the State, opened the widest field for practice. But filial duty kept him nearer home. His father was now infirm from the advance of years, and had no other son at home. Under these circumstances Mr. Webster opened an office at Boscawen not far from his father's residence, and commenced the practice of the law in this retired spot. Judge Webster lived but a year after his son's entrance upon the practice of his profession; long enough, however, to hear his first argument in court, and to be gratified with the confident predictions of his future success.

"In May, 1807, Mr. Webster was admitted an attorney and counsellor of the Superior Court in New Hampshire, and in September of that year, relinquishing his office in Boscawen to his Brother Ezekiel, he removed to Portsmouth, in conformity with his original intention. Here he remained in the practice of his profession for nine successive years. They were years of assiduous labor, and of unremitted devotion to the study and practice of the law. He was associated with several persons of great eminence, citizens of New Hampshire or of Massachusetts, occasionally practising at the Portsmouth bar. Among the latter were Samuel Dexter and Joseph Storey; of the residents of New Hampshire, Jeremiah Mason was the most distinguished.

"During the greater part of Mr. Webster's practice of the law in New Hampshire, Jeremiah Smith was Chief Justice of the state, a learned and excellent judge, whose biography has been written by the Rev. John H. Morrison, and will well repay perusal. Judge Smith was an early and warm friend of Judge Webster, and this friendship descended to the son, and glowed in his breast with fervor till he went to his grave. Although dividing with Mr. Mason the best of the business of Portsmouth, and indeed of all the eastern portion of the State, Mr. Webster's practice was mostly on the circuit. He followed the Superior Court through the principal counties of the state, and was retained in nearly every important cause. It is mentioned by Mr. March, as a somewhat singular fact in his professional life, that, with the exception of the occasions on which he has been associated with the Attorney-General of the United States for the time being, he has hardly appeared ten times as junior counsel. Within the sphere in which he was placed, he may be said to have risen at once to the head of his profession; not, however, like Erskine and some other celebrated British lawyers, by one and the same bound, at once to fame and fortune. The American bar holds forth no such golden prizes, certainly not in the smaller states. Mr. Webster's practice in New Hampshire, though probably as good as that of any of his contemporaries, was never lucrative. Clients were not very rich, nor the concerns litigated such as would carry heavy fees. Although exclusively devoted to his profession, it afforded him no more than a bare livelihood. But the time for which he practised at the New Hampshire bar was probably not lost with reference to his future professional and political eminence. His own standard of legal attainment was high. He was associated with professional brethren fully competent to put his powers to their best proof, and to prevent him from settling down in early life into an easy routine of ordinary professional practice. It was no disadvantage under these circumstances (except in reference to immediate pecuniary benefit), to enjoy some portion of that leisure for general reading, which is almost wholly denied to the lawyer of commanding talents, who steps immediately into full practice in a large city."

The memoir, which extends through nine chapters, comprising a survey of the intellectual and political life of Mr. Webster, down to the last year, ends as follows:

"Such, in a brief and imperfect narrative, is the public life of Mr. Webster, extending over a period of forty years, marked by the occurrence of events of great importance. It has been the aim of the writer to prevent the pen of the biographer from being too much influenced by the partiality of the friend. Should he seem to the candid not wholly to have escaped that error, (which, however, he trusts will not be the case,) he ventures to hope that it will be forgiven to an intimacy which commenced in the youth of one of the parties and the boyhood of the other, and which has subsisted for nearly half a century. It will be admitted, he thinks, by every one, that this career, however inadequately delineated, has been one of singular eminence and brilliancy. Entering upon public life at the close of the first epoch in the political history of the United States under the present Constitution, Mr. Webster has stood below none of the distinguished men who have impressed their character on the second.

"There is a class of public questions in reference to which the opinions of most men are greatly influenced by prejudices founded in natural temperament, early associations, and real or supposed local interest. As far as such questions are concerned, it is too much to hope that, in times of high party excitement, full justice will be done to prominent statesmen by those of their contemporaries who differ from them. We greatly err, however, if candid men of all parties, and in all parts of the country, do not accord to Mr. Webster the praise of having formed to himself a large and generous view of the character of an American statesman, and of having adopted the loftiest standard of public conduct. They will agree that he has conceived, in all its importance, the position of the country as a member of the great family of nations, and as the leading republican government. In reference to domestic politics it will be as generally conceded, that, reposing less than most public men on a party basis, it has been the main object of his life to confirm and perpetuate the great work of the constitutional fathers of the last generation. By their wisdom and patriotic forethought we are blessed with a system in which the several states are brought into a union so admirably composed and balanced,—both complicated and kept distinct with such skill,—as to seem less a work of human prudence than of Providential interposition. Mr. Webster has at all times been fully aware of the evils of anarchy, discord, and civil war at home, and of utter national insignificance abroad, from which the formation of the Union saved us. He has been not less sensible to the obstacles to be overcome, the perils to be encountered, and the sufferings to be borne, before this wonderful framework of government could be established. And he has been persuaded that, if destroyed, it can never be reconstructed. With these views, his life has been consecrated to the maintenance in all their strength of the principles on which the Constitution rests, and to the support of the system created by it.

"The key to his whole political course is the belief that, when the Union is dissolved, the internal peace, the vigorous growth, and the prosperity of the states, and the welfare of their inhabitants, are blighted for ever, and that, while the Union endures, all else of trial and calamity which can befall a nation may be remedied or borne. So believing, he has pursued a course which has earned for him an honored name among those who have discharged the duty of good citizens with the most distinguished ability, zeal, and benefit to the country. In the relations of civilized life, there is no higher service which man can render to man, than thus to preserve a wise constitution of government in healthful action. Nor does the most eloquent of the statesmen of antiquity content himself with pronouncing this the highest human merit. In that admirable treatise on the Republic, of which some precious chapters have been restored to us after having been lost for ages, he does not hesitate to affirm, that there is nothing in which human virtue approaches nearer the divine, than in establishing and preserving states."



ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING.

Miss Mitford, in her pleasant Reminiscences of a Literary Life, gives the following sketch of this charming poetess:

"My first acquaintance with Elizabeth Barrett commenced about fifteen years ago. She was certainly one of the most interesting persons that I had ever seen. Every body who then saw her said the same; so that it is not merely the impression of my partiality or my enthusiasm. Of a slight, delicate figure, with a shower of dark curls falling on either side of a most expressive face, large, tender eyes, richly fringed by dark eyelashes, a smile like a sunbeam, and such a look of youthfulness that I had some difficulty in persuading a friend, in whose carriage we went together to Chiswick, that the translatress of the 'Prometheus' of AEschylus, the authoress of the 'Essay on Mind,' was old enough to be introduced into company, in technical language, 'was out.' Through the kindness of another invaluable friend, to whom I owe many obligations, but none so great as this, I saw much of her during my stay in town. We met so constantly and so familiarly that, in spite of the difference of age, intimacy ripened into friendship, and after my return into the country, we corresponded freely and frequently, her letters being just what letters ought to be—her own talk put upon paper.

"The next year was a painful one to herself and to all who loved her. She broke a blood-vessel upon the lungs, which did not heal. If there had been consumption in the family, that disease would have intervened. There were no seeds of the fatal English malady in her constitution, and she escaped. Still, however, the vessel did not heal, and after attending her for above a twelvemonth at her father's house in Wimpole street, Dr. Chambers, on the approach of winter, ordered her to a milder climate. Her eldest brother, a brother in heart and talent worthy of such a sister, together with other devoted relatives, accompanied her to Torquay, and there occurred the fatal event which saddened her bloom of youth, and gave a deeper hue of thought and feeling, especially of devotional feeling, to her poetry. I have so often been asked what could be the shadow that had passed over that young heart, that, now that time has softened the first agony, it seems to me right that the world should hear the story of an accident in which there much sorrow, but no blame.

"Nearly a twelvemonth had passed, and the invalid, still attended by her affectionate companions, had derived much benefit from the mild sea-breezes of Devonshire. One fine summer morning, her favorite brother, together with two other fine young men, his friends, embarked on board a small sailing-vessel for a trip of a few hours. Excellent sailors all, and familiar with the coast, they sent back the boatmen, and undertook themselves the management of the little craft. Danger was not dreamt of by any one; after the catastrophe, no one could divine the cause, but, in a few minutes after their embarkation, and in sight of their very windows, just as they were crossing the bar, the boat went down, and all who were in her perished. Even the bodies were never found. I was told by a party who were travelling that year in Devonshire and Cornwall, that it was most affecting to see on the corner houses of every village street, on every church door, and almost on every cliff for miles and miles along the coast, handbills, offering large rewards for linen cast ashore, marked with the initials of the beloved dead; for it so chanced that all the three were of the dearest and the best; one, I believe, an only son, the other the son of a widow.

"This tragedy nearly killed Elizabeth Barrett. She was utterly prostrated by the horror and the grief, and by a natural but a most unjust feeling that she had been, in some sort, the cause of this great misery. It was not until the following year that she could be removed, in an invalid carriage, and by journeys of twenty miles a day, to her afflicted family and her London home. The house that she occupied at Torquay had been chosen as one of the most sheltered in the place. It stood at the bottom of the cliffs, almost close to the sea; and she told me herself that during that whole winter the sound of the waves rang in her ears like the moans of one dying. Still she clung to literature and to Greek; in all probability she would have died without that wholesome diversion of her thoughts. Her medical attendant did not always understand this. To prevent the remonstrances of her friendly physician, Dr. Barry, she caused a small edition of Plato to be so bound as to resemble a novel. He did not know, skilful and kind though he were, that to her, such books were not an arduous and painful study, but a consolation and a delight. Returned to London, she began the life which she continued for so many years, confined to one large and commodious but darkened chamber, admitting only her own affectionate family and a few devoted friends (I, myself, have often joyfully travelled five-and-forty miles to see her, and returned the same evening without entering another house), reading almost every book worth reading in almost every language, and giving herself, heart and soul, to that poetry of which she seemed born to be the priestess. Gradually her health improved. About four years ago she married Mr. Browning, and immediately accompanied him to Pisa. They then settled at Florence; and this summer I have had the exquisite pleasure of seeing her once more in London with a lovely boy at her knee, almost as well as ever, and telling tales of Italian rambles, of losing herself in chestnut forests, and scrambling on mule-back up the sources of extinct volcanoes. May Heaven continue to her such health and such happiness!"



THE HAPPINESS OF OYSTERS.

The last Westminster Review contains a pleasant scientific article under the title of "Shell Fish, their Ways and Works," in which the subject so much debated lately, whether the lower orders of animals are capable of reason, has some new and amusing illustrations. Generous and honestly disposed lovers of good dinners will be gratified with the notion that oysters receive as well as communicate a degree of happiness. The reviewer treats the subject in the following luminous manner:

"And then the oyster itself—the soul and body of the shell—is there no philosophy in him or her? For now we know that oysters are really he and she, and that Bishop Sprat, when he gravely proposed the study of oyster-beds as a pursuit worthy of the sages who, under the guidance of his co-Bishop, Wilkins, and Sir Christopher Wren, were laying the foundation stones of the Royal Society, was not so far wrong when he discriminated between lady and gentleman oysters. The worthy suggester, it is true, knew no better than to separate them according to the color of their beards; as great a fallacy, as if, in these days of Bloomerism, we should propose to distinguish between males and females by the fashion of their waistcoats or color of their pantaloons; or, before this last great innovation of dress, to, diagnose between a dignitary episcopal and an ancient dame by the comparative length of their respective aprons. In that soft and gelatinous body lies a whole world of vitality and quiet enjoyment. Somebody has styled fossiliferous rocks 'monuments of the felicity of past ages.' An undisturbed oyster-bed is a concentration of happiness in the present. Dormant though the several creatures there congregated seem, each individual is leading the beatified existence of an epicurean god. The world without—its cares and joys, its storms and calms, its passions, evil and good—all are indifferent to the unheeding oyster. Unobservant even of what passes in its immediate vicinity, its whole soul is concentrated in itself; yet not sluggishly and apathetically, for its body is throbbing with life and enjoyment. The mighty ocean is subservient to its pleasures. The rolling waves waft fresh and choice food within its reach, and the flow of the current feeds it without requiring an effort. Each atom of water that comes in contact with its delicate gills involves its imprisoned air to freshen and invigorate the creature's pellucid blood. Invisible to human eye, unless aided by the wonderful inventions of human science, countless millions of vibrating cilia are moving incessantly with synchronic beat on every fibre of each fringing leaflet. Well might old Leeuwenhoek exclaim, when he looked through his microscope at the beard of a shell-fish, 'The motion I saw in the small component parts of it was so incredibly great, that I could not be satisfied with the spectacle; and it is not in the mind of conceive all the motions which I beheld within the compass of a grain of sand.' And yet the Dutch naturalist, unaided by the finer instruments of our time, beheld but a dim and misty indication of the exquisite cilliary apparatus by which these motions are effected. How strange to reflect that all this elaborate and inimitable contrivance has been devised for the well-being of a despised shell-fish? Nor is it merely in the working members of the creature that we find its wonders comprised. There are portions of its frame which seem to serve no essential purpose in its economy: which might be omitted without disturbing the course of its daily duties, and yet so constant in their presence and position, that we cannot doubt their having had their places in the original plan according to which the organization of the mollusk was first put together. These are symbols of organs to be developed in creatures higher in the scale of being; antitypes, it may be, of limbs, and anticipations of undeveloped senses. These are the first draughts of parts to be made out in their details elsewhere; serving, however, an end by their presence, for they are badges of relationship and affinity between one creature and another. In them the oyster-eater and the oyster may find some common bond of sympathy and distant cousinhood.

"Had the disputatious and needle-witted schoolmen known of these most curious mysteries of vitality, how vainly subtle would have been their speculations concerning the solution of such enigmas?"



THE RECLAIMING OF THE ANGEL.

WRITTEN FOR THE INTERNATIONAL MONTHLY MAGAZINE.

BY ALICE CAREY.

Oh smiling land of the sunset, How my heart to thy beauty thrills— Veiled dimly to-day with the shadow Of the greenest of all thy hills! Where daisies lean to the sunshine, And the winds a plowing go, And break into shining furrows The mists in the vale below; Where the willows hang out their tassels, With the dews, all white and cold, Strung over their wands so limber, Like pearls upon chords of gold; Where in milky hedges of hawthorn The red-winged thrushes sing, And the wild vine, bright and flaunting, Twines many a scarlet ring; Where, under the ripened billows Of the silver-flowing rye, We ran in and out with the zephyrs— My sunny-haired brother and I.

Oh, when the green kirtle of May time, Again o'er the hill-tops is blown, I shall walk the wild paths of the forest, And climb the steep headlands alone— Pausing not where the slopes of the meadows Are yellow with cowslip beds, Nor where, by the wall of the garden, The hollyhocks lift their bright heads. In hollows that dimple the hill-sides, Our feet till the sunset had been, Where pinks with their spikes of red blossoms, Hedged beds of blue violets in, While to the warm lip of the sunbeam The check of the blush rose inclined, And the pansy's white bosom was flushed with The murmurous love of the wind.

But when 'neath the heavy tresses That swept o'er the dying day, The star of the eve like a lover Was hiding his blushes away, As we came to a mournful river That flowed to a lovely shore, "Oh, sister," he said, "I am weary— I cannot go back any more!" And seeing that round about him The wings of the angels shone— I parted the locks from his forehead And kissed him and left him alone. But a shadow comes over my spirit Whenever I think of the hours I trusted his feet to the pathway That winds through eternity's flowers.



THE ENEMY OF VIRGINIA.

WRITTEN FOR THE INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE BY ASA SMITH, M. D.

The London Examiner, in reviewing Mr. McCulloch's new work on Wages, etc., seems to be displeased that the author should have expressed himself against the cultivation and use of tobacco, using the following language in its defence: "We quarrel," says the Examiner, "with Mr. McCulloch, for bestowing offensive epithets on tobacco, which he is pleased to call 'this filthy and offensive stimulant.' Why it should be more filthy to take a pinch of snuff or a whiff of tobacco smoke, than to swallow a quart of port wine, is not to us intelligible. Of all the stimulants that men have had recourse to, tea and coffee excepted, tobacco is the least pernicious. For the life of you, you cannot get drunk on it, however well disposed, and no man or woman has ever been charged with committing a crime under its influence—save only the factitious crime created by an irrational and excessive duty. For the best part of three centuries, all the nations of the earth have been using tobacco—saint, savage, and sage, being among the consumers."

The Examiner may quarrel with Mr. McCulloch for abusing the "weed," if it pleases, but it is a weak argument, if argument it can be called, to say that because taking a pinch of snuff, or a whiff of tobacco, is no worse than taking a quart of port wine, therefore the use of tobacco is good; or because tobacco is the least pernicious of all the stimulants, therefore it is not objectionable; or because one cannot get drunk on it, (which, by the way, is a great mistake,) or because for the best part of three centuries all the nations of the earth have been using tobacco—saint, savage and sage—therefore it is not a "filthy and offensive stimulant." The real object of the Examiner, however, in defending the cultivation and use of tobacco, will appear by reading a little further. "Of all people," says the reviewer, "we ourselves are the most moderate consumers; yet the 'filthy and offensive stimulant' puts four millions and a half a year into our exchequer. An old financier, like Mr. McCulloch, ought, on this account alone, to have treated the weed with more respect." Here then is the true reason why the London Examiner is disposed to quarrel with that author. Nor can it be a "filthy and offensive stimulant," because, forsooth, it puts four millions and a half a year into England's exchequer! Upon this mode of reasoning, what an inestimable blessing must opium be to the world, and especially to the Chinese! We have only to say, that if tobacco yields this immense revenue annually to England, any one who passes through Eastern Virginia and sees the poverty stricken appearance of the thousands of acres of exhausted useless land which present themselves in every direction, will be able to determine at whose expense this has been, in a great measure. If England has been enriched by the traffic in tobacco, its cultivation has been the ruin of Eastern Virginia, by far the larger portion of which now lies in open uncultivated sterile commons, bleaching in the sun.

Virginia, we are glad to know, is at last awaking to her true condition and interests; the rapid increase of population in the northern and western states, and the proportionate improvement in their arts, sciences and agricultural industry, have excited in the minds of our people, no inconsiderable attention. While it is true of Western Virginia, that if not advancing with a rapidity equalling that of many of the states, she is nevertheless improving, and with her almost inexhaustible mineral wealth, and productiveness of soil, must continue to improve, if the inhabitants persist in declining to cultivate tobacco. It is painfully true of Eastern Virginia—if we except the cities—that if not just at this time retrograding, the change from a retrograde to a stationary condition has been but recent, and some time must necessarily elapse before any marked evidence of an advance will be perceptible. There are even yet to be found, on the borders of James River and in other parts of Virginia, the wealthy, intelligent, and hospitable planter, living in style and entertaining with liberality scarcely unequal to that which distinguished Virginia in bygone days. Such are still to be encountered, though not often. The Virginia gentleman has been elbowed out. Like the Knickerbockers of New York—most of whom have shaken the ashes from their pipes, and gone off—the old Virginia gentleman has disappeared—but been displaced by a different enemy from that which disturbed the cogitations of the honest Dutchman. While Mein Herr, happy and contented, sat in the door of his simple dwelling, enjoying the pleasure of his pipe, he little thought, or if he thought, he little cared perhaps, that the weed which afforded so much comfort to his constitutionally comfortable frame, was drawing forth the substance and exhausting the soil of one of the richest, fairest and most attractive portions of the earth, and would in time cover its surface with a stunted sickly growth of pine, through which the wind might pour her low sad requiem for departed life. The honest Hollander and his good vrow have gone on their journey, exiled by the enterprising Yankee, or by the needy foreigner. The old Virginia gentleman has gone, or is going—finding that his "old fields" are rapidly increasing, and his crop of tobacco year by year diminishing—where no hopes to find a richer soil and a better market.

For some years past, most of the counties in Eastern Virginia have produced very little tobacco—some of them none at all. When we recall to mind that this section of Virginia was once by far the richest part of the state, and not to be surpassed by any soil in the country—that it was celebrated for the large crops and excellent quality of its tobacco—we naturally look for the reasons of this change. Now, although our good friends down below, are very sensitive upon the subject, we have no hesitation in saying that the cause generally assigned is the true one, viz., that the soil is exhausted, worn out, and therefore cannot produce tobacco, or any thing else of consequence. And here let me encroach upon established rules and digress for a few moments, leaving tobacco, to give my reader a little advice to aid him should he ever visit the "Old Dominion." In the first place, if you stop at any point along the shore, and especially should you reach Hampton, never speak of "crabs." If you are fond of them, get them the best way you can; you will have no difficulty in finding them; have them cooked, and eat them; but don't ask for them—don't speak of them. The people of Virginia, like those of most other places, are sensitive on some points; and it would be no less impolite to speak of crabs in Hampton, than it would be to speak of "persimmons" in Fluvanna County.

In the second place, never speak of the ague and fever, especially if you visit on the rivers, unless it be to say, that the place from which you came is very subject to this complaint. If you take this position you are safe, for should you be attacked (cases have been known even in Virginia), why you have only to say you were so unfortunate as not to leave home quite soon enough to avoid the disease. Mind what I, an M.D. of the calomel and quinine school—no Homoeopathist, but one of the regular troop—say upon this matter. No false charges, either direct or indirect, no inuendos by look, word, or deed, that you might possibly have taken the ague and fever after your arrival! It would be absurd, at least, in you to say so. Not that the people would lay violent hands upon you—and yet on sober second thoughts I am not so sure of this, if we are to judge from the toast given by a young gentleman who attended the Printers' anniversary celebration of the birth of Benjamin Franklin, at the City Hotel, Richmond, on the night of Saturday, 17th of January: "A [symbol: hand] to our friends, and a [symbol: dagger] for our enemies." This, perhaps, might have been simply to vary the entertainment of the evening. We ought not be hasty in drawing conclusions, for another young citizen, on the same occasion, gave the following: "The first families of Virginia—like stars seen in the ocean, they would not be there but for their bright originals in heaven." It is evident from this, although there is no roundabout tedious effort to prove the thing, that the "first families" of Virginia are not only as the stars of heaven in number—not only as thick as stars, but that like the stars they are absolutely in heaven, and, having carried their family dignity thither, are emitting their light to the benighted angels—occasional sparks sometimes dropping down from them to their numberless descendants, living here upon the shadows of their grandfathers. It may not be amiss, in order to save future digression, to say that the Smith in my name is on the paternal side. Should you come to Virginia, you will hear of the Smiths. You have already beard of Pocahontas. Well, the land on which her father lived was famous for its tobacco: it would now be dear at three dollars per acre. A short time since, while on a visit to and in conversation with one of the most distinguished men of Virginia, who owns and resides on a plantation on the James River, a few miles above Richmond—observing the neatness of every thing around, the superiority of his land and the largeness of his wheat and corn crops, I inquired about his tobacco. "I never cultivate tobacco," said he, "I detest it, for it has been the ruin of the state." This is the testimony of one of Virginia's most prominent and most enlightened sons, a graduate of William and Mary College, and the friend of Bishop Madison, Thomas Jefferson, and most of Virginia's other distinguished men, living in his day—one who, in age, has passed the threescore and ten allotted to mankind, and whose dignified yet gentle bearing tells that he is one of the survivors of a class now nearly extinct, "the Virginia gentleman of the old school."

Pass through almost any part of Eastern Virginia, and wherever you go will be found immense tracts of land, barren and useless, which were once rich and productive, but which have been exhausted in the cultivation of tobacco. And yet—notwithstanding this, and strange as it may appear—there are still to be found among the people of lower Virginia men who deny that the raising of this crop impoverishes the soil, and who on the contrary insist that the culture of tobacco enriches it. They are ready to acknowledge that the land has been exhausted, but contend that it is owing to the cultivation of corn, and not of tobacco. This, it need hardly be said, is maintained only by those who are engaged in raising tobacco. Facts however are stubborn things, and it may be well to present, just at this time, one or two in point.

Virginia, when first settled, possessed a soil far superior to that of any of the Eastern or Middle States. Little or no tobacco has ever been raised in those states, while corn has been one of the chief products. In Virginia, where tobacco has been the principal crop, the land has deteriorated, the rich soil has been exhausted, and become more sterile than were the bleak hills of New England when the Pilgrim reached her shores; while in New England, where corn has been produced in abundance, and but very little tobacco, the soil has been improved until it has become almost or quite as rich as that of Virginia was at any time since its settlement. In this day the most unproductive of the New England states has soil superior to that of Eastern Virginia.

Another fact that cannot be denied is, that wherever tobacco has been raised for any length of time, the result has been invariably the same—without a single exception, the land has been exhausted, and abandoned as useless. A particular portion of a plantation, it is true, has been, and may be again for a time, kept very rich by concentrating upon it all the fertilizing substance produced; but this must of course be at the expense of all other parts of the plantation, and operate eventually to the disadvantage of the small part kept rich at the expense of the whole; for unless there be considerable attention paid to other parts of the land, besides those appropriated to the raising of tobacco, the manure will no longer be found on the plantation, and general exhaustion and sterility must follow.

From what has been said about tobacco the reader will imagine, perhaps, that I am an enemy to the noxious weed. Not altogether so; but the reason, if not precisely similar to that which calls forth the article in the London Examiner, springs from the same impulse: I love a good cigar, and have been in my day an inveterate smoker, but hope, and am now endeavoring, to overcome the useless and enervating habit, more especially since I have seen the poverty and desolation occasioned in Virginia from the cultivation of tobacco. Still I must confess, that even now, like an old war horse when he smells powder, am I, when I come in contact with the odoriferous exhalation of a good cigar. If he with delight snuffs in his expanded nostrils the fumes of saltpetre and charcoal, I, with no less pleasure, inhale the odor of a good Havana. If he chafes and prances to rush into the battle, in me rises an elate spirit, when, in the midst of a band of smokers, I see through the fog, slowly curling and ascending, a miniature gallery of "long nines" issuing from their port-holes, and hear the puffs, and see the smoke. At such a time it is not safe to offer me a cigar, for then I feel like him of the Examiner, that it is not well to be too hard upon an enemy. Snuff I detest, and always have detested, notwithstanding the fact that I once bought a gold snuff-box, upon the lid of which I had my family coat-of-arms engraved.

"Off again! Why don't you keep to the point?" doubtless exclaims the reader. The truth is, my position as an assailant of tobacco is somewhat peculiar, such as may be appreciated by one who, having had a friend to whom he is under obligation, has been led, upon meeting that friend, and finding him in discredit, to give him the "cold shoulder." It goes hard with my feeling, if not with my conscience, to speak against tobacco. Yet whatever virtue the weed itself may possess, it is now almost universally conceded, that the cultivation of tobacco will ruin a country. Let any one take a survey of lower Virginia, and he cannot help coming to the conclusion, that it not only impoverishes the land, but if followed up for a number of years, will be very apt to impoverish the children of those who engage in its cultivation. Tobacco, say its advocates, is a very profitable crop,—if by profit is meant a large return in money, without reference to any thing else—granted. Much money has been and will be made by cultivating it, and if the parent, as the money is received, would safely invest it for the benefit of himself and children, so that provision would be made for the time when he grows old and they advance, and the land becomes exhausted and useless, they will do very well. But few are sufficiently considerate to make this provision, since it is naturally supposed that a plantation which for a number of years has yielded a superabundance will not be likely to fail in the future. They cannot see that year after year, slowly but surely, the substance of their land is being taken away in the form of tobacco, and that in the end their plantations will be barren and useless. Estates comprising thousands of acres of good land yield annually large incomes, upon which their owners live, with their families, in great affluence. Surrounded by servants who stand ready to attend to every want, the children are reared from their infancy with scarcely a wish ungratified—thereby contracting most expensive habits, and becoming, through the mistaken kindness and indulgence of their parents, altogether unfitted for the hardships of life when adversity comes upon them. It is not, in fact, often the case that parents so situated remember that a change may take place by which they or their children may be thrown upon the world and compelled to rely upon their own exertions for a living. But experience shows that the cultivation of tobacco tends almost inevitably to this. As year after year passes on, section after section of productive land is taken up, and that which has become already exhausted is left to put forth stunted pines, and await the recuperative powers of nature. Thus men live on, with an increasing family and a large and rapidly increasing number of servants to support, until perhaps the head of the house is called away by death, and the estate, if free from incumbrance, is divided among the children. Another generation succeeds, and another division takes place—the soil all this time becoming poor and poorer, and the quantity of land at each subdivision becoming less for every member,—until a general exhaustion is perceived, the land is left a wilderness, and the family scattered over the country; the females, sensitive, well-educated, and spirited, unfitted for contact with the world, and the sons too often branded as spendthrifts because they cannot manage to live upon the land that supported their fathers and their grandfathers.



A WORD ABOUT THE ARMY-PRIVATE.

WRITTEN FOR THE INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE.

We cannot make up our mind to look on this member of the universal Yankee nation with quite as much distrust as is often evinced; with that distrust which lies most where he is least known. Scarce one-sixth of the lookers-on—as the liveried gentleman with a straight knee and stiff upper-lip keeps up the ninety to a minute down the sunny side of Greenwich-street—know aught of the animal, save that every day he struts up and down at about the same hour. Mothers have nothing to say for him, while fathers pass him with quite a look of contempt. Betty, perhaps, is the least timid, and is foolish enough to let spurs and cock-feathers tinge her dreams all night long, beside thinking of them a dozen times next day. If she is from the old country, she has seen them all her life, and has many friends "as went a soldiering." The little boys are more of the Betty order, and always show him the greatest admiration and respect: as may be seen, any day, in the miniature evolutions to the public squares, which always display enthusiasm, if not the accuracy of strategical art. If there is but one private, you will always be sure to find a captain and a drummer, and the army is complete.

Why the senior and more intellectual world and his wife are more wary of the Greenwich dragoon, is a question not easy of solution. Perhaps they have read in books that he is apt to commit sundry excesses, not approved of in the Scriptures, after the siege is over; or that, like Captain Dalgetty, he will sometimes fight for plunder; or that his profession tends to "solitude and calling it peace." In a measure these charges are certainly true; partly because poor human nature is frail, and partly that there are tricks in all trades; not, however, we think, to the extent that he should suffer excommunication without a hearing, and while his own or adopted flag waves tranquilly over the land. Give him credit when he deserves it, for it is his especial lot, when down, to have no friends. In stirring times, however, when death is within the walls and the enemy hard pressing at the gates, he has advocates and admirers without number; then he has virtues worthy of notice; and while his body receives the ball, his heart is praised for its devotion. Women have embroidered silken banners for him, to strengthen his courage in their defence, and put fine words thereon to serve him as a rallying cry. In our revolutionary days, when the old continental spirit was abroad, he was respected to a degree unknown perhaps at the present time. The mistress entertained him with a hearty will, and the respectable dame, who, when there was no flannel for making cartridges, dropped something in the street that would make a dozen or more, enjoyed the joke all her life, besides receiving a pension from Congress. That he really receives now so much distrust, it is either because we know nothing about him, or because the lightning age is so far advanced as to leave his humble merits out of sight in the rear. He is rarely noisy—never insults you—and passes well to the right in the street. He is often polite, too; and if he does not, like Jack, offer to carry a lady's muff, it is because his land-service has taught him the big thing is not as heavy as it looks. If a mob defies the law, he will stand the stones until one has knocked him out of the ranks. In short, he is a complete protector and servitor of laws, of mothers, daughters, wives, and property,—and, at the end of all, receiving his pittance with a "Good luck to those who live better and get more."

It is not our intention, be it known, to attempt doing away with any prejudice good society may entertain for one of its "sworn defenders;" for, as we have hinted, the soldier is not presumptuous, and never curses his unlucky stars. Our only object is, to give a brief pen-and-ink sketch of the man in his bonded condition; in fine, say so much, or so little, about him, that the uninitiated, sitting by the warm fire-side, and reading of the great cold in latitude 49 deg., or of the hot pursuit in the Camanche country, may know something of poor Tobin, who is made to suit every climate and every emergency.

It has often been a wonder with the curious, why enlistments take place in times of profound peace; and the probable causes that lead to such steps are, of course, much debated. We remember seeing, not long ago, in the newspapers, a brief table of such causes, purporting to come from an army surgeon who examined each recruit on the subject. It was funny, and so startling withal, that while some laughed or stood aghast, others hardly knew which to admire most, the doctor's eccentricity, or his fertile fancy. We know not if in the world's vast library there is any reliable exhibition of such causes. Sir Walter Scott's imaginary Clutterbuck, after some prefatory doubts, leaves the following as perhaps his principal reason: "This happy vacuity of all employment appeared to me so delicious, that it became the primary hint, which, according to the system of Helvetius, as the minister says, determined my infant talents towards the profession I was destined to illustrate." Such may be the idea of some at the present day, though Clutterbuck's declaration is by no means sacred authority. He confesses he was unmilitary enough to damn reveille, and also, to a significant rebuke from his old colonel. "I am no friend to extravagance, Ensign Clutterbuck," said he, "but on the day when we are to pass before the sovereign of the kingdom, in the name of God, I would have at least shown him an inch of clean linen." The truth is, the causes are about as various as the trades they subscribe to, or, if one more than another be predominant, it is "the love of the thing." In the old countries, the drum and fife mingled their music with the first pleasant scenes he ever saw; and, in the new world, the same enlivening sounds also awoke the spirit of childhood. Early associations had merely lain dormant for a season, but those connected with the bright musket and sabre were stronger than those of the spade and figure-maker's mould.

Having before us the roll of a company now in service, we will take from it such information as may be pertinent, premising that the record is so nearly like that of every other, that the little difference, as mathematicians say, may be disregarded without affecting the general result. Of the whole number (fifty), thirty-eight are between twenty and thirty years of age, ten between thirty and forty, and two between forty and forty-five. Five were born in England, three in Scotland, twenty-one in Ireland, five in Germany, thirteen in the United States, two in Prussia, and one in Italy. They subscribed, at the time of enlistment, the following trades: five farmers, one spinner, twelve laborers, one weaver, one tinsmith, one painter, two gardeners, three bakers, two shoemakers, two tailors, one carpenter, one printer, one cigar-maker, nine soldiers, four clerks, one turner, and one figure-maker (the Italian); and one pretends to be a lawyer, though, as he may be an imposter, we will have due regard for the sensitive feelings of our legal friends, and set him down as only a pettifogger. Sixteen cannot read or write, and of these, three are of the United States, and the remainder nearly all from Ireland. It is quite a treat in chirography to see the signatures of the residue of the fifty, as they stand in the column. They are not so imposing as John Hancock's on the Declaration, nor as small as a schoolmistress's copy; but assume all shapes and styles, from the "clerkly fist," to the genuine "crow-track," or Chinese characters on a tea-chest.

Be it as it may, after he swears to serve well and faithfully the United States against all her enemies and opposers whatsoever, he is sent to New-York harbor, if he is to do foot-work, or to Carlisle Barracks, if a horse is to do it for him; and in one of these places the transformation from civil to military life begins. In two hours after his arrival you would hardly know him. With hair cut close, and a complete revolution in his dress, he looks nothing like the "sovereign" of this mighty Republic you have just seen. He feels the change, too; and as he struts up and down, peacock-like, admiring himself, he realizes that hitherto, for many years perhaps, he has not had a new suit from tip to toe all for nothing. It has saved him weary days of toil, and the little personal liberty he has given in exchange is but dust in the balance. As soon as "the vapors melt into morn," the drum sounds the reveille, and up he rises to receive instructions, which are repeated and repeated until he has them at his tongue's and fingers' ends. At all times, if well-behaved, he receives the necessary recreations and indulgences. To follow him closely throughout his tuition, would be to extend this article more than is intended, besides outraging the military knowledge of many by a recital of elementary instruction. Suffice it to say, after a certain period, he is sent to some post on the sea-board, or to active service on the frontier.

The term of enlistment varies in different countries. In England, formerly, it extended to twenty-one years; but the law has lately reduced it to ten. In our service it is for five years only, with the privilege of re-enlisting, if at the end of that time the applicant is still sound in body and mind. He then becomes an "old soldier;" a term which, for some reason or other, is used in civil life with no complimentary import. It has a better meaning in service, however, which is well exemplified in the French proverb, "Il n'est chasse que de vieux chiens" (old dogs are staunch hunters). The pay also varies, and it is a feather in the cap of our Government that we may say she is in this respect more liberal than any other. In France, Prussia, Germany, Austria, and Russia, a private, with all economy, cannot save more than six cents a-day; yet when we consider the vast number each is obliged to keep under arms, we cannot suppose them able to pay more. England, whose "public debt is a public blessing," also looms up largely in the battle array, and pays better than her neighbors. With her artillery-private (or gunner as he is more properly called), we will compare a private of the United States artillery, or infantry, since both are on a par in this respect. The former receives one shilling fourpence farthing, or thirty-three and one-half cents, per day, from which, deducting his rations and clothing, there will be left thirteen and one-half cents, or about four dollars per month. The latter receives seven dollars per month, beside his rations and clothing. In the British infantry regiments, the private has but one shilling per day, and the Queen graciously allows him one penny of "beer-money."

The artillery-company of England is perhaps the best organized and most efficient in the world; while ours is merely nominal, and a sore subject to the accomplished officers attached to it. It is called artillery, but infantry is more appropriate. At nearly all the forts, the siege pieces and implements of the artillerist are packed away in storehouses, without a particle of benefit to those for whom they are intended. In Mexico, on the march to Orizaba, it had the mortification to trudge along on foot, while midshipmen commanded sections of a light battery, marines were cannoneers, and sailors rode the horses, using, in their amphibious state, the oddest medley of sea-terms and military jargon that ever grated on professional ears. It would have been equally proper to put an artillery captain in command of the frigate Cumberland then lying in the harbor of Vera Cruz, with no less a prospect of brilliant manoeuvres in the hour of battle. The English company is really what it purports to be, and is one hundred and twenty strong, including eight corporals and four bombardiers; besides, it has eight serjeants, three buglers, one second and one first lieutenant, one second captain (brevet-captain in our service), and one first captain. The aggregate here is fifty-eight, not quite one-half of the British company.

It will be seen, from what has been said, that the Greenwich dragoon, or foot soldier, is, in five cases out of six, either a Dutchman, Irishman, or American; and an observer can easily perceive in each his national characteristic and temperament. Karl is dull and heavy, generally sober, always ready to lend his pipe, or sing a song. Pat is merry, loves a glass at any time, is handy with the spade, and uses his mother-wit in rounding off a capital story. Jonathan is all these, and something more. He astonishes his trans-atlantic comrades by the incomprehensible manner in which the knave will turn up when he deals the "pictures;" and the neat manner in which he mends the rent in his coat sleeve; is one short of funds, he will generously lend him a safe amount until "next pay day," provided, at that time, fifty per cent. be added thereto; and, if some doubt arises in the mean time, he disposes of his stock to some other speculator; so that Wall-street-like panics are not unfrequent—sometimes among the bulls, sometimes among the bears. If he chooses, he will do more work in less time, or less work in more time, than Karl or Patrick, and he often manages to make a cats-paw of them to scratch out his delinquencies. He knows well how to make use of the technicalities of the limited monarchy under which he is governed, and bewilders dull Karl by his manifold risks and little punishment.

It matters not whether our man is cooped up at Eastport, or bivouacked on the Rio-Grande—he is every where essentially the same. With scarce a thought beyond the morrow, he awaits it without impatience. In all places, and at all times, he has great respect for his officer; the gracefully touching his cap being no idle ceremony. At the close of a weary day's march, he will leave his own to put up his tent; build a fire near it, and do every favor he can, freely and willingly. Officers will recognize this fact, and attribute the secret to the strict non-familiarity between them.

He has three festivals during the year, when he sets a splendid table and enjoys himself—the two wintry holidays, and the anniversary of our national independence. There are songs and speeches in abundance, and the oratory is genuine. If he lingers long at the table—or under it—there is so much power in the "star spangled banner," or "Erin is my home," that he must become a martyr to their glorious enthusiasm. On one of these occasions, a little lady friend christened an aldermanic German by a patriotic name which since has taken the place of his own. "He was a man of an unbounded stomach," seemingly, with the French maxim ever uppermost in his mind: Quand la cornemuse est pleine on en chant mieux (when the belly is full, the music goes better). An escopette ball at Molino-del-Rey struck him on the head, and the ponderous mass rolling over and over on the ground, he was left for dead, but his time had not yet come. It was a heavy blow, and though alive, yet his reason, at times, is gone: predicting something novel in the history of man to happen on the 4th of April next. Another joyful day is the visit of the paymaster, which happens six times a year. His last supply is gone—hence his anxiety to replenish. He is very happy to see this financial individual—as much so as any body was with the arrival of the first California steamer with two millions in gold. His only drawback is, that his mortal enemy, the sutler, is then invariably ready to face him with a small bill for sundry articles, such as cheese, whiting, and "some drinks." He had no idea it was so large! Generally he pays to a fraction; sometimes, like broken banks, he compromises for a certain per centum; sometimes he repudiates in toto. He is often economical, spending nothing, and transmitting his savings to destitute relations at home or abroad. A thousand hearts were gladdened, and a thousand mouths fed, in the poor Emerald Isle during her starving days, by five pound drafts from "the bold soldier-boy" over the water. These substantial tokens from the home of his adoption have a secret but visible effect. The military roads he lays out are found and followed by the recipients of his bounty, and gardens flourish where but yesterday were seen the poles of his old camping ground; new states rise out the wilderness, where he planted the early seed, and watched the glittering things as they grew to the strength and beauty of their starry sisters.

He has no enmity or prejudice against any person, sect, or society—loving Broadbrim even more than could reasonably be expected. There is, however, a proverbial enmity between him and Jack the sailor, though it is generally of that Pickwickian nature, that—like Micawber's griefs—easily dissolves over a bowl of punch, and both become as jolly as Friar Tuck and Richard. He is not generally religious; but during divine service is as orderly as a deacon. Sometimes he pleads conscience against Protestant worship, but those interested may be assured that, in five cases out of six, it is only Pat's cunning: true piety can worship God under any form. He is generally a bachelor, and rarely goes beyond the walls for a wife: if Abigail comes inside, he snaps her up as you would a hotcake on a frosty morning. If he dies prematurely, some comrade is ready to console the widow in her affliction; the courtship being a fine exemplification of—

"For you must know a widow's won With brisk attempt and putting on: With ent'ring manfully and urging— Not slow approaches like a virgin."

Should she fail, however, she trips off to another post, where, "her case being duly represented at the mess," she generally manages to get reinstated in the army. It is for the good of the service that marriage is in some degree restricted, and the reasons therefor, none will fail to perceive.

The soldier's history and accounts are posted up regularly every two months at Washington—that great ledger of the United States—so that if he has been sentenced to a money stoppage, or broken a tumbler-screw, it is there accurately recorded. He is kept well supplied, where it is practicable, with the news of the day, contained in two dailies, one of which, generally, is from New-York, and the other from Washington. At nearly all the principal posts neat little chapels have been built, and chaplains provided, so that he can worship God, if he desires, morning and evening, and without expense.

The discipline governing him is severe; so much so that it is sometimes made ground of complaint. This severity is necessary for the creation and preservation of prompt obedience and clock-like regularity. Severe laws are necessary in every body—civil, religious, and military—and in no one, it is fair to say, are they more strictly enforced than in the army of the United States. The sad penalty of death is rarely, if ever, decreed, except in a regularly constituted war. A fearful instance of it occurred in the valley of Mexico during our late contest with that crumbling republic. Fifty deserters were condemned, but their execution temporarily delayed by the officer in charge, that they might see the stars and stripes run up over the falling castle of Chapultepec, and their last gaze on earth be fixed, as well on the faithful valor of their comrades, as on the flag they had shamelessly forsaken. As their bodies swung to and fro, well relieved against the sky, and the setting sun cast its lurid beams over countenances yet warm in death, many felt the extreme severity yet justice of military law, particularly in an enemy's country. In time of peace the punishment varies from a dishonorable discharge to little temporary deprivations and confinements, except for insubordination and desertion, when the law again permits of considerable severity. The stories about long confinements in dreary holes, starvation, &c., which we sometimes see in the "newspapers of little circulation," are about as true as the nursery tales in children's primers. Of the minor punishments, those which combine an appeal to his pride are the most dreaded, and often have a salutary effect. A mounted trooper would rather perform picket duty all night, in any weather, than once take a stationary gallop on the wooden "bob-tailed nag," facing the other way. The soldier's crimes—nearly all—are criminal only in that they offend against military laws; and if once in a while he has a hearing before Justice M., "you should not," as he contends, "expect all the cardinal virtues for seven dollars a month."

Wherever the pioneer has laid his axe, there you will find the soldier, a ready watch-dog between the settler and the savage; and it is a great misnomer for any one "in Congress assembled," to call him one of a "peace establishment," as three-fifths of his number are now on active service. In Florida—encamped in hammocks, or on the banks of some unhealthy stream—he is parleying with the Seminole; while in New Mexico, and over the vast frontier of Texas, he is engaged in deadly war with other tribes: the war seeming to be without a beginning, as well as without an end. In the back grounds of California, he escorts the treaty-making powers, while with his axe he lays out military roads, and measures them as he goes along. After a long march over the Rocky Mountains, or a sea-voyage of twenty thousand miles round the "stormy cape"—we find him, again, constructing block-houses along the Columbia river in Oregon; as much to protect him against the winter's cold, as to serve as means of future defence. The United States constitute a large patch of ground on the map of nations, with much work to do on her extensive frontier; and he is the pack-horse that tugs faithfully at the burden. Far away from the many comforts and conveniences that surround you—in prairie or wilderness—often without clothes, oftener without food—in sunshine and storm—winter and summer—in the midst of sickness and death—relentless foes on the hill-tops and in the valleys—he toils on, with no help from Congress to do what ought to be, but what cannot be done: certainly, cannot be done! for there are well known "treaty stipulations," and the lawmakers expect him, generally on foot, to pursue, overtake, and severely punish the well-mounted savage. Fatal error! every southerly wind brings with it a wail of the dying border man, and Mexico will yet, ere the present "long parliament" closes, present her wrongs before the proper source, the master—not the man. But we have digressed once or twice into extraneous topics: they germinated from the subject, and as they can do no harm, let them stand as written.

Do not suppose, then, because the Greenwich recruit is well-clothed, and somewhat proud withal, that his life is one of comparative ease. In virtue of all he does for you and your children's children, while plenty is on your right and on your left hand, rank him far above the hireling in its corrupted sense. He does much for the mite given him in return, and never murmurs at the task. At early dawn he rises, slings his knapsack, fills his canteen from the brook, and, with a scant ration in his haversack, marches a long Texan summer's day, recounting to his comrade some adventure in the old country, or the last news from the white settlements. At night, he spreads his blanket on the ground, his knapsack serves as pillow, and with no covering but the stars, he awaits the coming day to renew the fruitless scout. Perhaps, as he faces the sky, he pictures in the clouds heavily rolling o'er the moon, a mimic battle, in which his company is in the thickest of the fight; perhaps he is dreaming of—what? It is hard to tell: it may be of Betty in return; it may be of a wee sister or dear old mother far away over the seas—whom, since many years he has not seen, and then, God help his sad and weary heart! the prospect is a dreary one indeed of ever beholding "sacred home" again. He has fought well for you in the days of the Knickerbockers and in the valley of Mexico, and the same brave spirit adorns the homely bosom still. If it is charge, he charges; stand, he stands; and should there at any time occur a suspicious retrograde movement, he'll punch you with his bayonet if you call it by any other name than that of masterly retreat. Congress, during its last session, provided a Military Asylum, so that when age or wounds have taken away his once hardy strength, he will have a peaceful refuge, until—

"Hark! the muffled drum sounds the last march of the brave, The soldier retreats to his quarters—the grave— Under Death, whom he owns his commander-in-chief— And no more he'll turn out with the ready relief."

As we cannot charge Uncle Sam with any extravagant degree of nepotism, we will commend Tobin to a bit more of the spare regard of the people of the United States—the "smartest nation in all creation"—a fact which John Bull pretends to disregard, and, like a traveller lost in the woods, whistles every now and then, to keep his courage up. In these days, when his great captains glide into the affections of the people, and thence into the chair of state, it were well to remember the Italian proverb, Il sangue del soldato fa grande il capitano, which, being interpreted, means, "The blood of the soldier makes the glory of the general!"



TO SUNDRY CRITICS.

WRITTEN FOR THE INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE.

BY R. H. STODDARD.

He steals and imitates, with wiry note The critics squeak, from Keats, and Tennyson, Shelly, and Hunt, and Wordsworth, every one, And many more whose works we know—by rote! But how, good sirs, if God created him Like unto these, though in their radiance dim? Nothing in Nature's round is infinite; The moulds of every kind are similar: A flower is like a flower; a star a star; And all the suns are lit with self-same light. How can he help, since Nature points the way, Following, if so he does, their noble school? Or you, by birth and habit, knave and fool, How can you help the trash you write—for pay?



THE "RED FEATHER."

AN INDIAN STORY.

WRITTEN FOR THE INTERNATIONAL MONTHLY MAGAZINE.

BY ISAAC M'LELLAN.

A century ago, the deep shadows of the untrimmed wilderness overspread the broad valleys and wild hills of western New-York. The sound of the squatter's axe had not then aroused the echoes of those remote solitudes; nor the smoke of the frontiersman's cabin curled above the tall branching oaks and the solemn hemlocks of the primeval forest. The ploughshare had not then turned the fertile glebe, nor the cattle browsed upon the tender herbage of that region, now so populous and cultivated. The red stag there shook his branching antlers, and bounded fearlessly through the open glades of the wood, or led the dappled doe or fawn, at rosy dawn, or mellow eventide, to drink at the ice-cold water-course, or the pellucid surface of the lake. The shaggy bear prowled in the briery thicket, or fed on the acorns that autumn shook down from the oak; and the tawny panther ranged unmolested in the rocky fastnesses of the hills, or lay in the leafy covert for its prey. The Indian hunter was then lord of the land. The Mohawk and the Oneida held the region from the waters of the Hudson to the shores where Erie and Ontario rolled upon the beach; and the smoke of the wigwam ascended by many a quiet stream and wood. The hunter's rifle echoed among the hills, and his arrow whistled in the glade—the war-dance and battle-song resounded in every valley; and the sharp canoe, urged by the flashing paddle, skimmed every stream and lake.

Many years since, a small band of marksmen of the Mohawk tribe, having wandered far from their hunting-ground, were ambushed by a war-party of the Oneidas, and their chief, Owaka, was slain in the contest. Wauchee, or the Red-Feather, the only son of the old chief, and now the head of the nation of the Mohawks, had been deeply distressed at his father's loss, and had sworn that he would take the scalp of an Oneida, before the flowers of another spring should bloom over his father's grave.

In the leafy month of June, the young chief wandered afar from the lovely valley of his native river in pursuit of a small hunting-party of the Oneidas who were said to be prowling in the neighborhood. He had followed for many days the trail of the fugitives, and had often come upon their deserted camp-fires, but had not yet overtaken them. They were on their return to their village, which was situated on the shores of the Ontario, where the Niagara river, after its mighty plunge at the Falls, empties into its frothy abyss. On a pleasant evening of summer-time, he paused to encamp for the night in a place where a transparent streamlet poured its crystal tribute into the bosom of the Genessee. A dense and lofty grove of pines advanced their ranks to the very edge of the stream, and afforded him a faithful shelter from the dews and breezes of night.

The hunter soon enkindled a roaring fire from the decayed and fallen branches of trees, and while his supper of venison broiled upon its embers, he flung himself upon the turf, wearied with his march. The Indian was a noble specimen of his race. His shapely limbs indicated the presence of extraordinary strength and activity. He was clad in a buckskin hunting-frock, handsomely ornamented with quills and feathers. His deer-skin leggins were fringed with the red-stained hair of some wild animal, and his neat moccasons were adorned in the extreme of savage fashion. On his head was placed a bunch of eagle-feathers, which fluttered gayly in the wind. A heavy rifle lay at his side, with its ornamented pouch and horn. In his belt were thrust the fatal knife and hatchet. A huge wolf-hound, the only companion of his expedition, stretched its limbs before the blaze, watching with hungry eyes the progress of the evening meal. But the night passed not away without adventure. A thick darkness had now fallen upon the woods, and the ruddy flames of the fire but partially illuminated the rough black shafts of the pines, whose plumed branches sighed mournfully overhead. Suddenly the hound sprang to his feet, with a fierce growl, at the same time glaring upward into the thick recesses of a towering pine-tree. For a moment the sharp eye of the hunter could discern no object of alarm; but he soon heard the branches creak, as with the movements of some wild creature. He presently heard a growl among the tree-tops, and discerned two flaming globes of fire, which he knew to be the eyeballs of some animal, illuminated by the flashes of his camp-fire. In an instant his rifle was poised at his shoulder, and its glittering sight brought in range with the shining objects of its alarm. For an instant the heavy tube was held motionless at its aim, and then the sharp crack of the weapon sounded on the air. Before the smoke of the discharge had dissolved in the breeze, a dark object tumbled headlong among the boughs, and at length plunged headlong in the midst of the flames, scattering the flashing sparks in all directions. With a furious yell the hound fastened upon the prey, and soon dragged forth from the flames the lifeless body of an immense panther, from one of whose perforated eyes the life-blood flowed in a copious stream. The Indian was greatly elated at his successful shot, and after removing with his knife one of its sharp claws as a trophy, and heaping fresh logs on the flames, he spread out his blanket and resigned himself to slumber.

The morning sun had not drank up the dew-drops that sparkled like gems on herb and foliage before the young hunter had again resumed his march. He followed with unerring precision the trail of the fugitives through thorny thicket and quaking morass, and ere the evening sun had dropped behind the hills, he came upon the encampment of his foe. The party had flung themselves upon the soft turf, beneath the drooping branches of a grove of cedars, and were enjoying their evening pipe, while a huge side of venison smoked upon the embers. The group consisted of tall and stalwart warriors, whose brawny limbs seemed well able to triumph in any act of savage barbarity they might be called upon to undertake. Some of them wore frocks of buckskin, and leggins of bright-colored cloth, ornamented with strings of wampum, tin trinkets and glass beads, that jingled with every motion of the wearer. Some wore feathers from the eagle's wing on their heads, as marks of rank. At the side of most of them rested an ornamented gun, while pouches and horns were suspended from the branches around. Each warrior was encircled with a belt of hide, in which glittered the usual implements of the chase and war. Some of the inferior ones carried only a stout ash bow, a sheaf of feathered arrows, and a weighty club of bone, adorned with quills and colored feathers.

The cunning Wauchee crept cautiously within a short distance of the camp, trusting that during the drowsy hours of the night he should be able to strike a blow; but to his chagrin he perceived that the party was on the alert, and that two wakeful sentinels constantly kept watch, while the others slept. On the following morning the party resumed their march, still followed by their pursuer, who hoped to cut off some straggler during the retreat; but no such victim fell in his way. In the course of a day or two the roar of waters, and the ascending mist of the cataract, warned them of their approach to the mighty falls of Niagara; and soon the Oneida party had encamped among the gloomy pines and hemlocks opposite the torrent.

Wauchee, though he had often heard among the dim traditions of his race, of the existence of an awful torrent of water, that poured for ever with a voice of thunder, among the remote woods of the wilderness, had never yet gazed on this stupendous spectacle, and now, as he listened to its earthquake voice with wonder, some such thoughts as the following may have agitated his mind:

'Tis pouring, 'tis pouring With a wild eternal roar; Like a sea, that's burst its barriers Resounding evermore: Like an ocean lash'd to fury, And toiling to o'erwhelm With its devastating billows The earth's extended realm.

It falleth, still it falleth, A deluge o'er the rocks; It calleth, still it calleth, With tones likes earthquake shocks: For ever and for ever, It sounds its mighty hymn; Like a thousand anthems pealing In some cathedral dim.

The dark pines shrink and tremble As o'er the abyss they lean, And falling are ingulf'd like reeds With all their branches green; And oaks from northern mountains, O'erwhelm'd by some fierce blast, Are rent like autumn flowerets, In that vast caldron cast.

A thousand years ago the tribes In wonder trod its side: Those tribes have vanish'd, but the Fall Still pours as full a tide; A thousand more may pass away— A future race of men May view the awful cataract Unchang'd dash down its glen.

How passing vain doth mortal pride Beside this torrent seem! An army doth not march to war With half its sound and gleam; While o'er it, like a banner, The rainbow spreads its fold, Colored with prismy glories Of purple and of gold.

The wild deer of the forest At the river stoop to drink, But from the rush of waters All panic-stricken shrink; And the mountain eagles sailing O'er the cataract's foaming brim Alarmed, on soaring pinions, Away, o'er Heaven's clouds skim.

O! who that views the wonders Of Nature o'er the earth; The high o'erhanging mountains Where thunders have their birth: And this eternal torrent, Majestically grand— Can doubt the Spirit's presence, And a Creating Hand?

On the following day the Oneidas resumed their march, and at nightfall reached an American military post, then just established at the entrance of the Niagara river, on the shore of Lake Ontario, called the Fort Niagara. The Oneidas entered within the barriers of the little stockade fortress, and there established their camp, and were soon busily engaged in arranging a treaty with the commandant of the place. Wauchee followed closely after, like a bloodhound on the trail, and selected his camp in a little grove just without the gates of the fortress. He then boldly sauntered within the walls, and mingled with cool indifference among the groups of soldiery, and the armed warriors of his foe. But under the semblance of friendship, lurked the fire of a spirit burning with hatred; and he could scarce restrain himself from plunging among them, and immolating numbers on the spot. Still the wary prudence of the savage restrained his hand, and he continued for a day or two to mingle in peace among them. The crafty Oneidas soon suspected the designs of the stranger, and they conferred among themselves, as to the surest mode of guarding against the meditated blow of Wauchee. They well recognized by his paint and garb the Mohawk warrior, and they resolved to baffle his assault, and for ever prevent his return to the people of his tribe.

But the designs of a bold and resolute man are not easily fathomed or thwarted, and the rude walls of the frontier fortress were unable to shut out so brave and active a warrior as the Mohawk chief. He was trained to stratagem, and sworn to vengeance; and now that his wild blood boiled with fury, no ramparts of mere wood and stone could effectually interpose between the avenger and the destroyers of his sire.

During the silence and gloom of night he succeeded in scaling the palings of the walls, and secretly and successfully made his way into the very heart of the fortress. He was surrounded with numbers of armed men slumbering upon their weapons; and many a pacing sentinel was stationed upon the breast-works, to guard against an open or a secret foe: yet the soft step and the gliding figure of the Mohawk passed along in the darkness unheard and undetected. After moving about swiftly among the sleepers for some time, he at length came upon the prostrate group of the Oneidas. Trusting to the vigilance of the garrison, the savages were all buried in slumber, and were outspread along the grassy floor, enwrapped in their blankets. The wily Mohawk went in like a serpent among them, and having recognized their sleeping chief by the eagle plume upon his head, he drew his scalp-knife, and with one mortal blow drove the weapon to the very heart of the dreamer. He then in an instant severed the bleeding scalp from the head, and sprang away to make good his escape, but was followed as instantly by a dozen dark forms, which bounded after him like so many leaping panthers. Still the daring young brave would have successfully effected his escape but for an unfortunate accident. With one quick bound he overleaped the barriers of the fort, but in alighting heavily on the sod he severely sprained his ankle, which so disabled him, that he fell an easy prey into the hands of his pursuers. He was instantly firmly bound with cords, and dragged back, amidst savage jeers and menaces, into the fortress.

On the following day the luckless captive was led away by his enemies to their neighboring village, which was situated at Messessaga Point, near the fortress. The warriors sadly bore, on a litter of branches, the body of their slain chieftain, leading beside it their pinioned captive. As they approached to the little rude hamlet where they dwelt, a motley crowd of old men, women, and children, came forth to welcome their return; but when they beheld the ghastly body of their late chief, and the drooping looks of the warriors, their joyful cries were exchanged for wails of lamentation, and they tore their hair, and expressed the most violent emotions of grief. They wept over the bleeding corpse of the victim, while they derided and buffeted the helpless prisoner. But the stout-hearted Wauchee moved onwards with a firm and erect gait, disturbed neither by the blows nor the menaces that were directed against him. He only exclaimed, "You have slain my chief and father, and lo! I have also struck down the head of your nation. It is well. Slay me—torture me, if you will. I can bear unmoved any torments you may inflict."

The captive, still bound securely with thongs of deer-hide, was thrust into a cabin; and two stout warriors were appointed to watch over him by day and night, and were charged to use the utmost vigilance in preventing his escape. A few dried bunches of fern were spread for his couch; and he was supplied with a wooden bowl of water and a handful of pounded corn to satisfy his appetite; and it was ordered that Monega, the most skilful mediciner of the tribe, should apply her most healing salves and balsams to his hurts, that he might the sooner be ready to run the gauntlet, and endure the torture of fire, which was the destiny awaiting him.

Monega was the daughter of a chief, and as it chanced, was as distinguished for the gentleness of her heart, as for her exceeding loveliness, and her great medical skill. No one could look upon her slight and well-rounded limbs, and upon her sweet countenance, without a feeling of admiration, if not of love; and no sooner did our Mohawk gaze upon her features, and listen to the soft tones of her voice, than he was completely fascinated with her charms. Nor did the Indian damsel gaze upon the noble captive with less favorable emotions. With a blushing cheek and trembling hand she produced from a number of gourds, the most potent herbs that constituted her remedies, and tenderly applied them to the wounded limbs of the Mohawk.

"How is the sweet daughter of the Oneida named?" inquired the young chief, as the damsel proceeded to bathe the bruised places with sweet-smelling medicines.

A blush suffused the modest cheek of Monega as she replied, "I am called among my people Monega, or the Wild-rose, and am the daughter of a chief."

"Monega," exclaimed he, "is fairer than any honeyed wild-rose that is kissed by the red lip of the morning, or than the pearly lily that droops by the brink of the running water. There is no maiden among the fair daughters of the Mohawk, so lovely in the eyes of Wauchee. Will not the Wild-rose return again the fondness that blooms in the breast of the strange warrior, though he lies like a wounded panther at the feet of his mistress?"

"The captive warrior," returned the maiden, "has a bold heart, and is more stately and noble than any of the young chiefs of her own people, yet Monega must not yield her heart to a chief of an enemy." And, so saying, she hastily gathered her herbs and unguents together, and withdrew beneath the suspended buffalo-hide that formed the door of the wigwam.

As the shades of evening began to settle on the deep woods that drooped around, the captive continued to listen intently for the returning step of the damsel; and presently the heavy drapery at the entrance was drawn aside, and the yellow flood of the setting sun streamed upon the figure of Monega. "The hours of the day," said the youth, "have been dark and weary to the heart of the captive, since the Wild-rose withdrew from the side of Wauchee, but now that she has returned, the light again shines in his heart, and his soul is filled with brightness and joy."

The maiden in silence produced her herbs and bandages, and after applying them to his hurts, thus replied to his words: "Wauchee is noble, and brave, but his days are now few and numbered. Let us speak with a low voice, for the two warriors are watchful at the door, and their jealous ears may catch the friendly word that may pass between us. Would the fettered chieftain desire to be freed from his bonds, and breathe once more the free breath of the woods, and again return to his distant people?"

"Gentle Monega!" cried he, "I pray thee, free these limbs from the hateful thongs that eat into the flesh, and so cramp his benumbed members, and Wauchee will fly like a deer to his own people, and also bear away with him the sweet Wild-rose of the Oneidas, to bloom afresh in the gardens of the Mohawks. Will Monega free the bondsman? and will she fly with him to be the bride of his heart, and the queen of the Mohawk people?

"Monega cannot refuse," said the maiden, after a little hesitation; "Monega cannot refuse to save the life of the brave and handsome young warrior; and if he asks it, neither can she refuse to depart with him, and cast her lot with his people."

"Monega speaks well," cried the captive, "and her words gladden my darkened spirit. Quick then, sever these bonds from my wrists and limbs, that I may stand forth once more a free man. I will then escape to the forest, and await you at the great fall of waters."

"I gladly free you from your thongs," said she, "and will not fail to join you where you appoint; but remember that two brave warriors guard with their weapons at the door, and that they will spare him not if he but offer to depart. Yet one of them, the young Thaygea, has vowed to me his love, and him will I entice away from his post of guard, and the captive must fain deal with the other as he may. Is Wauchee content to make the trial?"

"Sever these thongs, and free these crippled limbs, bright maiden, and I would not shrink from an armed host. Do you entice away one of my guards, and I will manage to escape from the other; and I shall then impatiently await your coming at the Falls."

The bold girl with a trembling hand cut away the gyves that held the prisoner, and then, departing, exchanged a few words with one of the young men who guarded the hut, and who instantly forsook his post to follow her footsteps. Wauchee hurriedly glanced around, to discover some article that might serve as a weapon, and, snatching up a small billet of wood that lay on the hearth, sprang to the door, and with one furious blow felled the solitary sentinel to the earth, and then stretched swiftly away in flight. But numbers of warriors, aroused by the sound of the blow, were instantly after him in hot pursuit. The flying Wauchee was most remarkable for his fleetness of foot, and could easily have distanced his pursuers, but for his wounded ankle, which greatly impeded his motions; and in a short time, after a desperate struggle, he was overpowered, and roughly dragged back to the place of his captivity.

Again did the fair Monega, whose agency in his attempted flight had not been suspected, attend upon her wounded lover; but so vigilant were his guards, that an attempt at escape seemed now impossible.

In the lapse of a few days, the prisoner, under her skilful treatment, had entirely recovered from his injuries, and a day was appointed for his death. He was doomed to "run the gauntlet" of the tribe; that is, he was required to run between two lines of warriors and of women and children, armed with thongs of hide and small rods, which each one was to use upon his person as the fugitive passed them in full career. On a bright and cheerful morning the luckless prisoner was loosened from his bonds, and led forth to run his race; after which he was doomed to perish at the stake. But the brave youth stepped forth with an undaunted eye, and a firm tread, to the place of torment. He eyed with a fearless and contemptuous glance the fearful preparations made for punishment; the long lines of his enemies ready with their rods to strike at him; and the blackened pole of sacrifice surrounded with its pile of faggots.