There was a mighty stir in the streets of Paris, as Paris' streets were in the olden time. A dense and eager mob had taken possession, at an early hour of the day, of all the environs of the Bastile, and lined the way which led thence to the Place de Greve in solid and almost impenetrable masses.

People of all conditions were there, except the very highest; but the great majority of the concourse was composed of the low populace, and the smaller bourgeoisie. Multitudes of women were there, too, from the girl of sixteen to the beldam of sixty, nor had mothers been ashamed to bring their infants in their arms into that loud and tumultuous assemblage.

Loud it was and tumultuous, as all great multitudes are, unless they are convened by purposes too resolutely dark and solemn to find any vent in noise. When that is the case, let rulers beware, for peril is at hand—perhaps the beginning of the end.

But this Parisian mob, although long before this period it had learned the use of barricades, though noisy, turbulent, and sometimes even violent in the demonstrations of its impatience, was any thing but angry or excited.

On the contrary, it seemed to be on the very tip-toe of pleasurable expectation, and from the somewhat frequent allusions to notre bon roi, which circulated among the better order of spectators, it would appear that the government of the Fifteenth Louis was for the moment in unusually good odor with the good folks of the metropolis.

What was the spectacle to which they were looking forward with so much glee—which had brought forth young delicate girls, and tender mothers, into the streets at so early an hour—which, as the day advanced toward ten o'clock of the morning, was tempting forth laced cloaks, and rapiers, and plumed hats, and here and there, in the cumbrous carriages of the day, the proud and luxurious ladies of the gay metropolis?

One glance toward the centre of the Place de Greve was sufficient to inform the dullest, for there uprose, black, grisly, horrible, a tall stout pile of some thirty feet in height, with a huge wheel affixed horizontally to the summit.

Around this hideous instrument of torture was raised a scaffold hung with black cloth, and strewed with saw-dust, for the convenience of the executioners, about three feet lower than the wheel which surmounted it.

Around this frightful apparatus were drawn up two companies of the French guard, forming a large hollow-square facing outwards, with muskets loaded, and bayonets fixed, as if they apprehended an attempt at rescue, although from the demeanor of the people nothing appeared at that time to be further from their thoughts than any thing of the kind.

Above was the executioner-in-chief, with two grim, truculent-looking assistants, making preparations for the fearful operation they were about to perform, or leaning indolently on the instruments of slaughter.

By and bye, as the day wore onward, and the concourse kept still increasing both in numbers and in the respectability of those who composed it, something of irritation began to show itself, mingled with the eagerness and expectation of the populace, and from some murmurs, which ran from time to time through their ranks, it would seem that they apprehended the escape of their victim.

By this time the windows of all the houses which overlooked the precincts of that fatal square on which so much of noble blood has been shed through so many ages, were occupied by persons of both sexes, all of the middle, and some even of the upper classes, as eager to behold the frightful and disgusting scene, which was about to ensue, as the mere rabble in the open streets below.

The same thing was manifest along the whole line of the thoroughfare by which the fatal procession would advance, with this difference alone, that many of the houses in that quarter belonging to the high nobility, and all with few exceptions being the dwellings of opulent persons, the windows, instead of being let like seats at the opera, to any who would pay the price, were occupied by the inhabitants, coming and going from their ordinary avocations to look out upon the noisy throng, when any louder outbreak of voices called their attention to the busy scene.

Among the latter, in a large and splendid mansion, not far from the Porte St. Antoine, and commanding a direct view of the Place de la Bastille, with its esplanade, drawbridge, and principal entrance, a group was collected at one of the windows, nearly overlooking the gate itself, which seemed to take the liveliest interest in the proceedings of the day, although that interest was entirely unmixed with any thing like the brutal expectation, and morbid love of horrible excitement which characterized the temper of the multitude.

The most prominent person of this group was a singularly noble-looking man, fast verging to his fiftieth year, if he had not yet attained it. His countenance, though resolute and firm, with a clear, piercing eye, lighted up at times, for a moment, by a quick, fiery flash, was calm, benevolent, and pensive in its ordinary mood, rather than energetical or active.[5] Yet it was easy to perceive that the mind, which informed it, was of the highest capacity both of intellect and imagination.

The figure and carriage of this gentleman would have sufficiently indicated that, at some period of his life, he had borne arms and led the life of a camp—which, indeed, at that day was only to say that he was a nobleman of France—but a long scar on his right brow, a little way above the eye, losing itself among the thick locks of his fine waving hair, and a small round cicatrix in the centre of his cheek, showing where a pistol ball had found entrance, proved that he had been where blows were falling thickest, and that he had not spared his own person in the melée.

His dress was very rich, according to the fashion of the day, though perhaps a fastidious eye might have objected that it partook somewhat of the past mode of the Regency, which had just been brought to a conclusion as my tale commences, by the resignation of the witty and licentious Philip of Orleans.

If, however, this fine-looking gentleman was the most prominent, he certainly was not the most interesting person of the company, which consisted, beside himself, of an ecclesiastic of high rank in the French church, a lady, now somewhat advanced in years, but showing the remains of beauty which, in its prime, must have been extraordinary, and of a boy in his fifteenth or sixteenth year.

For notwithstanding the eminent distinction, and high intellect of the elder nobleman, the dignity of the abbé, not unsupported by all which men look for as the outward and visible signs of that dignity, and the grace and beauty of the lady, it was upon the boy alone that the eye of every spectator would have dwelt, from the instant of its first discovering him.

He was tall of his age, and very finely made, of proportions which gave promise of exceeding strength when he should arrive at maturity, but strength uncoupled to any thing of weight or clumsiness. He was unusually free, even at this early period, from that heavy and ungraceful redundance of flesh which not unfrequently is the forerunner of athletic power in boys just bursting into manhood; for he was already as conspicuous for the thinness of his flanks, and the shapely hollow of his back, as for the depth and roundness of his chest, the breadth of his shoulders, and the symmetry of his limbs.

His head was well set on, and his whole bearing was that of one who had learned ease, and grace, and freedom, combined with dignity of carriage, in no school of practice and mannerism, but from the example of those with whom he had been brought up, and by familiar intercourse from his cradle upward with the high-born and gently nurtured of the land.

His long rich chestnut hair fell down in natural masses, undisfigured as yet by the hideous art of the court hair-dresser, on either side his fine broad forehead, and curled, untortured by the crisping-irons, over the collar of his velvet jerkin. His eyes were large and very clear, of the deepest shade of blue, with dark lashes, yet full of strong, tranquil light. All his features were regular and shapely, but it was not so much in the beauty of their form, or in the harmony of their coloring that the attractiveness of his aspect consisted, as in the peculiarity and power of his expression.

For a boy of his age, the pensiveness and composure of that expression were indeed almost unnatural, and they combined with a calm firmness and immobility of feature, which promised, I know not what of resolution and tenacity of purpose. It was not gravity, much less sternness, or sadness, that lent so powerful an expression to that young face; nor was there a single line which indicated coldness or hardness of heart, or which would have led to a suspicion that he had been schooled by those hard monitors, suffering and sorrow. No, it was pure thoughtfulness, and that of the highest and most intellectual order, which characterized the boy's expression.

Yet, though it was so thoughtful, there was nothing in the aspect whence to forebode a want of the more masculine qualifications. It was the thoughtfulness of a worker, not of a dreamer—the thoughtfulness which prepares, not unfits a man for action.

If the powers portrayed in that boy's countenance were not deceptive to the last degree, high qualities were within, and a high destiny before him.

But who, from the foreshowing and the bloom of sixteen years, may augur of the finish and the fruit of the three-score and ten, which are the sum of human toil and sorrow?

It was now nearly noon, when the outer drawbridge of the Bastile was lowered and its gate opened, and forth rode, two a-breast, a troop of the mousquetaires, or life-guard, in the bright steel casques and cuirasses, with the musquetoons, from which they derived their name, unslung and ready for action. As they issued into the wider space beyond the bridge, the troopers formed themselves rapidly into a sort of hollow column, the front of which, some eight file deep, occupied the whole width of the street, two files in close order composing each flank, and leaving an open space in the centre completely surrounded by the horsemen.

Into this space, without a moment's delay, there was driven a low black cart, or hurdle as it was technically called, of the rudest construction, drawn by four powerful black horses, a savage-faced official guiding them by the ropes which supplied the place of reins. On this ill-omened vehicle there stood three persons, the prisoner, and two of the armed wardens of the Bastile, the former ironed very heavily, and the latter bristling with offensive weapons.

Immediately in the rear of this car followed another troop of the life-guard, which closed up in the densest and most serried order around and behind the victim of the law, so as to render any attempt at rescue useless.

The person, to secure whose punishment so strong a military force had been produced, and to witness whose execution so vast a multitude was collected, was a tall, noble-looking man of forty or forty-five years, dressed in a rich mourning-habit of the day, but wearing neither hat nor mantle. His dark hair,[6] mixed at intervals with thin lines of silver, was cut short behind, contrary to the usage of the times, and his neck was bare, the collar of his superbly laced shirt being folded broadly back over the cape of his pourpoint.

His face was very pale, and his complexion being naturally of the darkest, the hue of his flesh, from which all the healthful blood had receded, was strangely livid and unnatural in its appearance. Still it did not seem that it was fear which had blanched his cheeks, and stolen all the color from his compressed lip, for his eye was full of a fierce, scornful light, and all his features were set and steady with an expression of the calmest and most iron resolution.

As the fatal vehicle which bore him made its appearance on the esplanade without the gates of the prison, a deep hum of satisfaction ran through the assembled concourse, rising and deepening gradually into a savage howl like that of a hungry tiger.

Then, then blazed out the haughty spirit, the indomitable pride of the French noble! Then shame, and fear, and death itself, which he was looking even now full in the face, were all forgotten, all absorbed in his overwhelming scorn of the people!

The blood rushed in a torrent to his brow, his eye seemed to lighten forth actual fire, as he raised his right hand aloft, loaded although it was with such a mass of iron, as a Greek Athlete might have shunned to lift, and shook it at the clamorous mob, with a glare of scorn and fury that showed how, had he been at liberty, he would have dealt with the revilers of his fallen state.

"Sacré canaille!" he hissed through his hard-set teeth, "back to your gutters and your garbage, or follow, if you can, in silence, and learn, if ye lack not courage to look on, how a man should die."

The reproof told; for, though at the contemptuous tone and fell insult of the first words the clamor of the rabble route waxed wilder, there was so much true dignity in the last sentiment he uttered, and the fate to which he was going was so hideous, that a key was struck in the popular heart, and thenceforth the tone of the spectators was changed altogether.

It was the exultation of the people over the downfall and disgrace of a noble that had found tongue in that savage conclamation—it was the apprehension that his dignity, and the interest of his great name, would win him pardon from the partial justice of the king, that had rendered them pitiless and savage—and now that their own cruel will was about to be gratified, as they beheld how dauntlessly the proud lord went to a death of torture, they were stricken with a sort of secret shame, and followed the dread train in sullen silence.

As the black car rolled onward, the haughty criminal turned his eyes upward, perchance from a sentiment of pride, which rendered it painful to him to meet the gaze, whether pitiful or triumphant, of the Parisian populace, and as he did so, it chanced that his glance fell on the group which I have described, as assembled at the windows of a mansion which he knew well, and in which, in happier days, he had passed gay and pleasant hours. Every eye of that group, with but one exception, was fixed upon himself, as he perceived on the instant; the lady alone having turned her head away, as unable to look upon one in such a strait, whom she had known under circumstances so widely different. There was nothing, however, in the gaze of all these earnest eyes that seemed to embarrass, much less to offend the prisoner. Deep interest, earnestness, perhaps horror, was expressed by one and all; but that horror was not, nor in anywise partook of, the abhorrence which appeared to be the leading sentiment of the populace below.

As he encountered their gaze, therefore, he drew himself up to his full height, and laying his right hand upon his heart bowed low and gracefully to the windows at which his friends of past days were assembled.

The boy turned his eye quickly toward his father as if to note what return he should make to that strange salutation. If it were so, he did not remain in doubt a moment, for that nobleman bowed low and solemnly to his brother peer with a very grave and sad aspect; and even the ecclesiastic inclined his head courteously to the condemned criminal.

The boy perhaps marveled, for a look of bewilderment crossed his ingenuous features; but it passed away in an instant, and following the example of his seniors, he bent his ingenuous brow and sunny locks before the unhappy man, who never was again to interchange a salute with living mortal.

It would seem that the recipient of that last act of courtesy was gratified even beyond the expectation of those who offered it, for a faint flush stole over his livid features, from which the momentary glow of indignation had now entirely faded, and a slight smile played upon his pallid lip, while a tear—the last he should ever shed—twinkled for an instant on his dark lashes. "True," he muttered to himself approvingly—"the nobles are true ever to their order!"

The eyes of the mob likewise had been attracted to the group above, by what had passed, and at first it appeared as if they had taken umbrage at the sympathy showed to the criminal by his equals in rank; for there was manifested a little inclination to break out again into a murmured shout, and some angry words were bandied about, reflecting on the pride and party spirit of the proud lords.

But the inclination was checked instantly, before it had time to render itself audible, by a word which was circulated, no one knew whence or by whom, through the crowded ranks—"Hush! hush! it is the good Lord of St. Renan." And therewith every voice was hushed, so fickle is the fancy of a crowd, although it is very certain that four fifths of those present knew not, nor had ever heard the name of St. Renan, nor had the slightest suspicion what claims he who bore it, had either on their respect or forbearance.

The death-train passed on its way, however, unmolested by any further show of temper on the part of the crowd, and the crowd itself following the[7] progress of the hurdle to the place of execution, was soon out of sight of the windows occupied by the family of the Count de St. Renan.

"Alas! unhappy Kerguelen!" exclaimed the count, with a deep and painful sigh, as the fearful procession was lost to sight in the distance. "He knows not yet half the bitterness of that which he has to undergo."

The boy looked up into his father's face with an inquiring glance, which he answered at once, still in the same subdued and solemn voice which he had used from the first.

"By the arrangement of his hair and dress I can see that he imagines he is to die as a nobleman, by the axe. May Heaven support him when he sees the disgraceful wheel."

"You seem to pity the wretch, Louis," cried the lady, who had not hitherto spoken, nor even looked toward the criminal as he was passing by the windows—"and yet he was assuredly a most atrocious criminal. A cool, deliberate, cold-blooded poisoner! Out upon it! out upon it! The wheel is fifty times too good for him!"

"He was all that you say, Marie," replied her husband gravely; "and yet I do pity him with all my heart, and grieve for him. I knew him well, though we have not met for many years, when we were both young, and there was no braver, nobler, better man within the limits of fair France. I know, too, how he loved that woman, how he trusted that man—and then to be so betrayed! It seems to me but yesterday that he led her to the altar, all tears of happiness, and soft maiden blushes. Poor Kerguelen! He was sorely tried."

"But still, my son, he was found wanting. Had he submitted him as a Christian to the punishment the good God laid upon him—"

"The world would have pronounced him a spiritless, dishonored slave, father," said the count, answering the ecclesiastic's speech before it was yet finished, "and gentlemen would have refused him the hand of fellowship."

"Was he justified then, my father?" asked the boy eagerly, who had been listening with eager attention to every word that had yet been spoken. "Do you think, then, that he was in the right; that he could not do otherwise than to slay her? I can understand that he was bound to kill the man who had basely wronged his honor—but a woman!—a woman whom he had once loved too!—that seems to me most horrible; and the mode, by a slow poison! living with her while it took effect! eating at the same board with her! sleeping by her side! that seems even more than horrible, it was cowardly!"

"God forbid, my son," replied the elder nobleman, "that I should say any man was justified who had murdered another in cold blood; especially, as you have said, a woman, and by a method so terrible as poison. I only mean exactly what I said, that he was tried very fearfully, and that under such trial the best and wisest of us here below cannot say how he would act himself. Moreover, it would seem that mistaken as he was perhaps in the course which he seems to have imagined that honor demanded at his hands, he was much mistaken in the mode which he took of accomplishing his scheme of vengeance. It was made very evident upon his trial that he did nothing, even to that wretched traitress, in rage or revenge, but all as he thought in honor. He chose a drug which consumed her by a mild and gradual decay, without suffering or spasm; he gave her time for repentance, nay, it is clearly proved that he convinced her of her sin, reconciled her to the part he had taken in her death, and exchanged forgiveness with her before she passed away. I do not think myself that to commit a crime himself can clear one from dishonor cast upon him by another's act, but at the same time I cannot look upon Kerguelen's guilt as of that brutal and felonious nature which calls for such a punishment as his—to be broken alive on the wheel, like a hired stabber—much less can I assent to the stigma which is attached to him on all sides, while that base, low-lived, treacherous, cogging miscreant, who fell too honorably by his honorable sword, meets pity—God defend us from such justice and sympathy!—and is entombed with tears and honors, while the avenger is crushed, living, out of the very shape of humanity by the hands of the common hangman."

The churchman's lips moved for a moment, as if he were about to speak in reply to the false doctrines which he heard enunciated by that upright and honorable man, and good father, but, ere he spoke, he reflected that those doctrines were held at that time, throughout Christian Europe, unquestioned, and confirmed by prejudice and pride beyond all the power of argument or of religion to set them aside, or invalidate them. The law of chivalry, sterner and more inflexible than that Mosaic code requiring an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth, which demanded a human life as the sacrifice for every rash word, for every wrongful action, was the law paramount of every civilized land in that day, and in France perhaps most of all lands, as standing foremost in what was then deemed civilization. And the abbé well knew that discussion of this point would only tend to bring out the opinions of the Count de St. Renan, in favor of the sanguinary code of honor, more decidedly, and consequently to confirm the mind of the young man more effectually in what he believed himself to be a fatal error.

The young man, who was evidently very deeply interested in the matter of the conversation, had devoured every word of his father, as if he had been listening to the oracles of a God; and, when he ceased, after a pause of some seconds, during which he was pondering very deeply on that which he had heard, he raised his intelligent face and said in an earnest voice.

"I see, my father, all that you have alleged in palliation of the count's crime, and I fully understand you—though I still think it the most terrible thing I ever have heard tell of. But I do not perfectly comprehend wherefore you ransack our language of all its deepest terms of contempt which to heap upon the head of the Chevalier de la Rochederrien? He[8] was the count's sworn friend, she was the count's wedded wife; they both were forsworn and false, and both betrayed him. But in what was the chevalier's fault the greater or the viler?"

Those were strange days, in which such a subject could have been discussed between two wise and virtuous parents and a son, whom it was their chiefest aim in life to bring up to be a good and honorable man—that son, too, barely more than a boy in years and understanding. But the morality of those times was coarser and harder, and, if there was no more real vice, there was far less superficial delicacy in the manners of society, and the relations between men and women, than there is nowadays.

Perhaps the true course lies midway; for certainly if there was much coarseness then, there is much cant and much squeamishness now, which could be excellently well dispensed with.

Beside this, boys were brought into the great world much earlier at that period, and were made men of at an age when they would have been learning Greek and Latin, had their birth been postponed by a single century.

Then, at fifteen, they held commissions, and carried colors in the battle's front, and were initiated into all the license of the court, the camp, and the forum.

So it came that the discussion of a subject such as that which I have described, was very naturally introduced even between parents and a beloved and only son by the circumstances of the day. Morals, as regards the matrimonial contract, and the intercourse between the sexes, have at all times been lower and far less rigid among the French, than in nations of northern origin; and never at any period of the world was the morality of any country, in this respect, at so low an ebb as was France under the reign of the Fifteenth Louis.

The Count de St. Renan replied, therefore, to his son with as little restraint as if he had been his equal in age, and equally acquainted with the customs and vices of the world, although intrigue and crime were the topics of which he had to treat.

"It is quite true, Raoul," replied the count, "that so far as the unhappy Lord of Kerguelen was concerned, the guilt of the Chevalier de la Rochederrien was, as you say, no deeper, perhaps less deep than that of the miserable lady. He was, indeed, bound to Kerguelen by every tie of friendship and honor; he had been aided by his purse, backed by his sword, nay, I have heard and believe, that he owed his life to him. Yet for all that he seduced his wife; and to make it worse, if worse it could be, Kerguelen had married her from the strongest affection, and till the chevalier brought misery, and dishonor, and death upon them, there was no wedded couple in all France so virtuous or so happy."

"Indeed, sir!" replied Raoul, in tones of great emotion, staring with his large, dark eyes as if some strange sight had presented itself to him on a sudden.

"I know well, Raoul, and if you have not heard it yet, you will soon do so, when you begin to mingle with men, that there are those in society, those whom the world regards, moreover, as honorable men, who affect to say that he who loves a woman, whether lawfully or sinfully, is at once absolved from all considerations except how he most easily may win—or in other words—ruin her; and consequently such men would speak slightly of the chevalier's conduct toward his friend, Kerguelen, and affect to regard it as a matter of course, and a mere affair of gallantry! But I trust you will remember this, my son, that there is nothing gallant, nor can be, in lying, or deceit, or treachery of any kind. And further, that to look with eyes of passion on the wife of a friend, is in itself both a crime, and an act of deliberate dishonor."

"I should not have supposed, sir," replied the boy, blushing very deeply, partly it might be from the nature of the subject under discussion, and partly from the strength of his emotions, "that any cavalier could have regarded it otherwise. It seems to me that to betray a friend's honor is a far blacker thing than to betray his life—and surely no man with one pretension to honor, would attempt to justify that."

"I am happy to see, Raoul, that you think so correctly on this point. Hold to your creed, my dear boy, for there are who shall try ere long to shake it. But be sure that is the creed of honor. But, although I think La Rochederrien disgraced himself even in this, it was not for this only that I termed him, as I deem him, the very vilest and most infamous of mankind. For when he had led that poor lady into sin; when she had surrendered herself up wholly to his honor; when she had placed the greatest trust—although a guilty trust, I admit—in his faith and integrity that one human being can place in another, the base dog betrayed her. He boasted of her weakness, of Kerguelen's dishonor, of his own infamy."

"And did not they to whom he boasted of it," exclaimed the noble boy, his face flushing fiery red with excitement and indignation, "spurn him at once from their presence, as a thing unworthy and beyond the pale of law."

"No, Raoul, they laughed at him, applauded his gallant success, and jeered at the Lord of Kerguelen."

"Great heaven! and these were gentlemen!"

"They were called such, at least; gentlemen by name and descent they were assuredly, but as surely not right gentlemen at heart. Many of them, however, in cooler moments, spoke of the traitor and the braggart with the contempt and disgust he merited. Some friend of Kerguelen's heard what had passed, and deemed it his duty to inform him. The most unhappy husband called the seducer to the field, wounded him mortally, and—to increase yet more his infamy—even in the agony of death the slave confessed the whole, and craved forgiveness like a dog. Confessed the woman's crime—you mark me, Raoul!—had he died mute, or died even with a falsehood in his mouth, as I think he was bound to do in such extremity, affirming her innocence with his last breath, he had saved her, and perhaps spared her wretched lord the misery of knowing certainly the depth of his dishonor."[9]

The boy pondered for a moment or two without making any answer; and although he was evidently not altogether satisfied, probably would not have again spoken, had not his father, who read what was passing in his mind, asked him what it was that he desired to know further.

Raoul smiled at perceiving how completely his father understood him, and then said at once, without pause or hesitation—

"I understand you to say, sir, that you thought the wretched man of whom we spoke was bound, under the extremity in which he stood, to die with a falsehood in his mouth. Can a gentleman ever be justified in saying the thing that is not? Much more can it be his bounden duty to do so?"

"Unquestionably, as a rule of general conduct, he cannot. Truth is the soul of honor; and without truth, honor cannot exist. But this is a most intricate and tangled question. It never can arise without presupposing the commission of one guilty act—one act which no good or truly moral man would commit at all. It is, therefore, scarcely worth our while to examine it. But I do say, on my deliberate and grave opinion, that if a woman, previously innocent and pure, have sacrificed her honor to a man, that man is bound to sacrifice every thing, his life without a question, and I think his truth also, in order to preserve her character, so far as he can, scathless. But we will speak no more of this. It is an odious subject, and one of which, I trust, you, Raoul, will never have the sad occasion to consider."

"Oh! never, father, never! I," cried the ingenuous boy, "I must first lose my senses, and become a madman."

"All men are madmen, Raoul," said the church-man, who stood in the relation of maternal uncle to the youth, "who suffer their passions to have the mastery of them. You must learn, therefore, to be their tyrant, for if you be not, be well assured that they will be yours—and merciless tyrants they are to the wretches who become their subjects."

"I will remember what you say, sir," answered the boy, "and, indeed, I am not like to forget it, for, altogether, this is the saddest day I ever have passed; and this is the most horrible and appalling story that I ever have heard told. It was but just that the Lord of Kerguelen should die, for he did a murder; and since the law punishes that in a peasant, it must do so likewise with a noble. But to break him upon the wheel!—it is atrocious! I should have thought all the nobles of the land would have applied to the king to spare him that horror."

"Many of them did apply, Raoul; but the king, or his ministers in his name, made answer, that during the Regency the Count Horn was broken on the wheel for murder, and therefore that to behead the Lord of Kerguelen for the same offence, would be to admit that the Count was wrongfully condemned."

"Out on it! out on it! what sophistry. Count Horn murdered a banker, like a common thief, for his gold, and this unhappy lord hath done the deed for which he must suffer in a mistaken sense of honor, and with all tenderness compatible with such a deed. There is nothing similar or parallel in the two cases; and if there were, what signifies it now to Count Horn, whether he were condemned rightfully or no; are these men heathen, that they would offer a victim to the offended manes of the dead? But is there no hope, my father, that his sentence may be commuted?"

"None whatsoever. Let us trust, therefore, that he has died penitent, and that his sufferings are already over; and let us pray, ere we lay us down to sleep, that his sins may be forgiven to him, and that his soul may have rest."

"Amen!" replied the boy, solemnly, at the same moment that the ecclesiastic repeated the same word, though he did so, as it would seem, less from the heart, and more as a matter of course.

Nothing further was said on that subject, and in truth the conversation ceased altogether. A gloom was cast over the spirits of all present, both by the imagination of the horrors which were in progress at that very moment, and by the recollection of the preceding enormities of which this was but the consummation; but the young Viscount Raoul was so completely engrossed by the deep thoughts which that conversation had awakened in his mind, that his father, who was a very close observer, and correct judge of human nature, almost regretted that he had spoken, and determined, if possible, to divert him from the gloomy revery into which he had fallen.

"Viscount," said he, after a silence which had endured now for many minutes, "when did you last wait upon Mademoiselle Melanie d'Argenson?"

Raoul's eyes, brightened at the name, and again the bright blush, which I noticed before, crossed his ingenuous features; but this time it was pleasure, not embarrassment, which colored his young face so vividly.

"I called yesterday, sir;" he answered, "but she was abroad with the countess, her mother. In truth, I have not seen her since Friday last."

"Why that is an age, Raoul! are you not dying to see her again by this time. At your age, I was far more gallant."

"With your permission, sir, I will go now and make my compliments to her."

"Not only my permission, Raoul, but my advice to make your best haste thither. If you go straight-ways, you will be sure to find her at home, for the ladies are sure not to have ventured abroad with all this uproar in the streets. Take Martin, the equerry, with you, and three of the grooms. What will you ride? The new Barb I bought for you last week? Yes! as well him as any; and, hark you, boy, tell them to send Martin to me first, I will speak to him while you are beautifying yourself to please the beaux yeux of Mademoiselle Melanie."

"I am not sure that you are doing wisely, Louis," said the lady, as her son left the saloon, her eye following him wistfully, "in bringing Raoul up as you are doing."

"Nor I, Marie," replied her husband, gravely. "We poor, blind mortals cannot be sure of any thing,[10] least of all of any thing the ends of which are incalculably distant. But in what particular do you doubt the wisdom of my method?"

"In talking to him as you do, as though he were a man already; in opening his eyes so widely to the sins and vices of the world; in discussing questions with him such as those you spoke of with him but now. He is a mere boy, you will remember, to hear tell of such things."

"Boys hear of such things early enough, I assure you—far earlier than you ladies would deem possible. For the rest, he must hear of them one day, and I think it quite as well that he should hear of them, since hear he must, with the comments of an old man, and that old man his best friend, than find them out by the teachings, and judge of them according to the light views of his young and excitable associates. He who is forewarned is fore-weaponed. I was kept pure, as it is termed—or in other words, kept ignorant of myself and of the world I was destined to live in, until one fine day I was cut loose from the apron-strings of my lady mother, and the tether of my abbé tutor, and launched head-foremost into that vortex of temptation and iniquity, the world of Paris, like a ship without a chart or a compass. A precious race I ran in consequence, for a time; and if I had not been so fortunate as to meet you, Marie, whose bright eyes brought me out, like a blessed beacon, safe from that perilous ocean, I know not but I should have suffered shipwreck, both in fortune, which is a trifle, and in character, which is every thing. No, no; if that is all in which you doubt, your fears are causeless."

"But that is not all. In this you may be right—I know not; at all events you are a fitter judge than I. But are you wise in encouraging so very strongly his fancy for Melanie d'Argenson?"

"I'faith, it is something more than a fancy, I think; the boy loves her."

"I see that, Louis, clearly; and you encourage it."

"And wherefore should I not. She is a good girl—as good as she is beautiful."

"She is an angel."

"And her mother, Marie, was your most intimate, your bosom friend."

"And now a saint in Heaven!"

"Well, what more; she is as noble as a De Rohan, or a Montmorency. She is an heiress with superb estates adjoining our own lands of St. Renan. She is, like our Raoul, an only child. And what is the most of all, I think, although it is not the mode in this dear France of ours to attach much weight to that, it is no made-up match, no cradle plighting between babes, to be made good, perhaps, by the breaking of hearts, but a genuine, natural, mutual affection between two young, sincere, innocent, artless persons—and a splendid couple they will make. What can you see to alarm you in that prospect?"

"Her father."

"The Sieur d'Argenson! Well, I confess, he is not a very charming person; but we all have our own faults or weaknesses; and, after all, it is not he whom Raoul is about to marry."

"I doubt his good faith, very sorely."

"I should doubt it too, Marie, did I see any cause which should lead him to break it. But the match is in all respects more desirable for him than it is for us. For though Mademoiselle d'Argenson is noble, rich, and handsome, the Viscount de Douarnez might be well justified in looking for a wife far higher than the daughter of a simple Sieur of Bretagne. Beside, although the children loved before any one spoke of it—before any one saw it, indeed, save I—it was d'Argenson himself who broke the subject. What, then, should induce him to play false?"

"I do not know, yet I doubt—I fear him."

"But that, Marie, is unworthy of your character, of your mind."

"Louis, she is too beautiful."

"I do not think Raoul will find fault with her on that score."

"Nor would one greater than Raoul."

"Whom do you mean?" cried the count, now for the first time startled.

"I have seen eyes fixed upon her in deadly admiration, which never admire but they pollute the object of their admiration."

"The king's, Marie?"

"The king's."

"And then—?"

"And then I have heard it whispered that the Baron de Beaulieu has asked her hand of the Sieur d'Argenson."

"The Baron de Beaulieu! and who the devil is the Baron de Beaulieu, that the Sieur d'Argenson should doubt for the nine hundredth part of a minute between him and the Viscount de Douarnez for the husband of his daughter?"

"The Baron de Beaulieu, count, is the very particular friend, the right hand man, and most private minister of his most Christian Majesty King Louis the Fifteenth!"

"Ha! is it possible? Do you mean that?—"

"I mean even that. If, by that, you mean all that is most infamous and loathsome on the part of Beaulieu, all that is most licentious on the part of the king. I believe—nay, I am well nigh sure, that there is such a scheme of villany on foot against that sweet, unhappy child; and therefore would I pause ere I urged too far my child's love toward her, lest it prove most unhappy and disastrous."

"And do you think d'Argenson capable—" exclaimed her husband—

"Of any thing," she answered, interrupting him, "of any thing that may serve his avarice or his ambition."

"Ah! it may be so. I will look to it, Marie; I will look to it narrowly. But I fear that if it be as you fancy, it is too late already—that our boy's heart is devoted to her entirely—that any break now, in one word, would be a heart-break."

"He loves her very dearly, beyond doubt," replied the lady; "and she deserves it all, and is, I think, very fond of him likewise."

"And can you suppose for a moment that she will lend herself to such a scheme of infamy?"

"Never. She would die sooner."[11]

"I do not apprehend, then, that there will be so much difficulty as you seem to fear. This business which brought all of us Bretons up to Paris, as claimants of justice for our province, or counters of the king's grace, as they phrase it, is finished happily; and there is nothing to detain any of us in this great wilderness of stone and mortar any longer. D'Argenson told me yesterday that he should set out homeward on Wednesday next; and it is but hurrying our own preparations a little to travel with them in one party. I will see him this evening and arrange it."

"Have you ever spoken with him concerning the contract, Louis?"

"Never, directly, or in the form of a solemn proposal. But we have spoken oftentimes of the evident attachment of the children, and he has ever expressed himself gratified, and seemed to regard it as a matter of course. But hush, here comes the boy; leave us awhile and I will speak with him."

Almost before his words were ended the door was thrown open, and young Raoul entered, splendidly dressed, with his rapier at his side, and his plumed hat in his hand, as likely a youth to win a fair maid's heart as ever wore the weapon of a gentleman.

"Martin is absent, sir. He went out soon after breakfast, they tell me, to look after a pair of fine English carriage horses for the countess my mother, and has not yet returned. I ordered old Jean François to attend me with the four other grooms."

"Very well, Raoul. But look you, your head is young, and your blood hot. You will meet, it is very like, all this canaille returning from the slaughter of poor Kerguelen. Now mark me, boy, there must be no vaporing on your part, or interfering with the populace; and even if they should, as very probably may, be insolent, and utter outcries and abuse against the nobility, even bear with them. On no account strike any person, nor let your servants do so, nor encroach upon their order, unless, indeed, they should so far forget themselves as to throw stones, or to strike the first."

"And then, my father?"

"Oh, then, Raoul, you are at liberty to let your good sword feel the fresh air, and to give your horse a taste of those fine spurs you wear. But even in that case, I should advise you to use your edge rather than your point. There is not much harm done in wiping a saucy burgher across the face to mend his manners, but to pink him through the body makes it an awkward matter. And I need not tell you by no means to fire, unless you should be so beset and maltreated that you cannot otherwise extricate yourself—yet you must have your pistols loaded. In these times it is necessary always to be provided against all things. I do not, however, tell you these things now because you are likely to be attacked but such events are always possible, and one cannot provide against such too early."

"I will observe what you say, my father. Have I your permission now to depart?"

"Not yet, Raoul, I would speak with you first a few words. This Mademoiselle Melanie is very pretty, is she not?"

"She is the most beautiful lady I have ever seen," replied the youth, not without some embarrassment.

"And as amiable and gentle as she is beautiful?"

"Oh, yes, indeed, sir. She is all gentleness and sweetness, yet is full of mirth, too, and graceful merriment."

"In one word, then, she seems to you a very sweet and lovely creature."

"Doubtless she does, my father."

"And I beseech you tell me, viscount, in what light do you appear in the eyes of this very admirable young lady?"

"Oh, sir!" replied the youth, now very much embarrassed, and blushing actually from shame.

"Nay, Raoul, I did not ask the question lightly, I assure you, or in the least degree as a jest. It becomes very important that I should know on what terms you and this fair lady stand together. You have been visiting her now almost daily, I think, during these three months last past. Do you conceive that you are very disagreeable to her?"

"Oh! I hope not, sir. It would grieve me much if I thought so."

"Well, I am to understand, then, that you think she is not blind to your merits, sir."

"I am not aware, my dear father, that I have any merits which she should be called to observe."

"Oh, yes, viscount! That is an excess of modesty which touches a little, I am afraid, on hypocrisy. You are not altogether without merits. You are young, not ill-looking, nobly born, and will, in God's good time, be rich. Then you can ride well, and dance gracefully, and are not generally ill-educated or unpolished. It is quite as necessary, my dear son, that a young man should not undervalue himself, as that he should not think of his deserts too highly. Now that you have some merits is certain—for the rest I desire frankness of you just now, and beg that you will speak out plainly. I think you love this young girl. Is it not so, Raoul?"

"I do love, sir, very dearly; with my whole heart and spirit."

"And do you feel sure that this is not a mere transient liking—that it will last, Raoul?"

"So long as life lasts in my heart, so long will my love for her last, my father."

"And you would wish to marry her?"

"Beyond all things in this world, my dear father."

"And do you think that, were her tastes and views on the subject consulted, she would say likewise?"

"I hope she would, sir. But I have never asked her."

"And her father, is he gracious when you meet him?"

"Most gracious, sir, and most kind. Indeed, he distinguishes me above all the other young gentlemen who visit there."

"You would not then despair of obtaining his consent?"

"By no means, my father, if you would be so kind as to ask it."

"And you desire that I should do so?"[12]

"You will make me the happiest man in all France, if you will."

"Then go your way, sir, and make the best you can of it with the young lady. I will speak myself with the Sieur d'Argenson to-night; and I do not despair any more than you do, Raoul. But look you, boy, you do not fancy, I hope, that you are going to church with your lady-love to-morrow or the next day. Two or three years hence, at the earliest, will be all in very good time. You must serve a campaign or two first, in order to show that you know how to use your sword."

"In all things, my dear father, I shall endeavor to fulfill your wishes, knowing them to be as kindly as they are wise and prudent. I owe you gratitude for every hour since I was born, but for none so much as for this, for indeed you are going to make me the happiest of men."

"Away with you, then, Sir Happiness! Betake yourself on the wings of love to your bright lady, and mind the advice of your favorite Horace, to pluck the pleasures of the passing hour, mindful how short is the sum of mortal life."

The young man embraced his father gayly, and left the room with a quick step and a joyous heart; and the jingling of his spurs, and the quick, merry clash of his scabbard on the marble staircase, told how joyously he descended its steps.

A moment afterward his father heard the clear, sonorous tones of his fine voice calling to his attendants, and yet a few seconds later the lively clatter of his horse's hoofs on the resounding pavement.

"Alas! for the happy days of youth, which are so quickly flown," exclaimed the father, as he participated the hopeful and exulting mood of his noble boy. "And, alas! for the promise of mortal happiness, which is so oft deceitful and a traitress." He paused for a few moments, and seemed to ponder, and then added with a confident and proud expression, "But I see not why one should forebode aught but success and happiness to this noble boy of mine. Thus far, every thing has worked toward the end as I would wish it. They have fallen in love naturally and of their own accord, and d'Argenson, whether he like it or no, cannot help himself. He must needs accede, proudly and joyfully, to my proposal. He knows his estates to be in my power far too deeply to resist. Nay, more, though he be somewhat selfish, and ambitious, and avaricious, I know nothing of him that should justify me in believing that he would sell his daughter's honor, even to a king, for wealth or title! My good wife is all too doubtful and suspicious. But, hark! here comes the mob, returning from that unfortunate man's execution. I wonder how he bore it."

And with the words he moved toward the window, and throwing it open, stepped out upon the spacious balcony. Here he learned speedily from the conversation of the passing crowd, that, although dreadfully shocked and startled by the first intimation of the death he was to undergo, which he received from the sight of the fatal wheel, the Lord of Kerguelen had died as becomes a proud, brave man, reconciled to the church, forgiving his enemies, without a groan or a murmur, under the protracted agonies of that most horrible of deaths, the breaking on the wheel.

Meanwhile the day passed onward, and when evening came, and the last and most social meal of the day was laid on the domestic board, young Raoul had returned from his visit to the lady of his love, full of high hopes and happy anticipations. Afterward, according to his promise, the Count de St. Renan went forth and held debate until a late hour of the night with the Sieur d'Argenson. Raoul had not retired when he came home, too restless in his youthful ardor even to think of sleep. His father brought good tidings, the father of the lady had consented, and on their arrival in Britanny the marriage contract was to be signed in form.

That was to Raoul an eventful day; and never did he forget it, or the teachings he drew from it. That day was his fate.

[To be continued.

Whatever our gifts may be, the love of imparting them for the good of others brings Heaven into the soul. Mrs. Child.

An old man, with a peaceful countenance, sat in a company of twelve persons. They were conversing, but he was silent. The theme upon which they were discoursing was Heaven; and each one who spoke did so with animation.

"Heaven is a place of rest," said one—"rest and peace. Oh! what sweet words! rest and peace. Here, all is labor and disquietude. There we shall have rest and peace."

"And freedom from pain," said another, whose pale cheeks and sunken eyes told many a tale of bodily suffering. "No more pain; no more sickness—the aching head will be at rest—the weary limbs find everlasting repose."

"Sorrow and sighing shall forever flee away," spoke up a third one of the company. "No more grief, no more anguish of spirit. Happy, happy change!"

"There," added a fourth, "the wounded spirit that none can bear is healed. The reed long bruised and bent by the tempests of life, finds a smiling sky, and a warm, refreshing, and healing sunshine. Oh! how my soul pants to escape from this world, and, like a bird fleeing to the mountains, get home again from its dreary exile."

"My heart expands," said another, "whenever I think of Heaven; and I long for the wings of a dove, that I may rise at once from this low, ignorant, groveling state, and bathe my whole soul in the sunlight of eternal felicity. What joy it will be to cast off this cumbersome clay; to leave this poor body behind, and spread a free wing upon the heavenly atmosphere. I shall hail with delight the happy moment which sets me free."

Thus, one after another spoke, and each one regarded Heaven as a state of happiness into which he was to come after death; but the old man still sat silent, and his eyes were bent thoughtfully upon the floor. Presently one said,

"Our aged friend says nothing. Has he no hope of Heaven? Does he not rejoice with us in the happy prospect of getting there when the silver chord shall be loosened, and the golden bowl broken at the fountain?"

The old man, thus addressed, looked around upon his companions. His face remained serene, and his eye had a heavenly expression.

"Have you not a blessed hope of Heaven? Does not your heart grow warm with sweet anticipations?" continued the last speaker.

"I never think of going to Heaven," the old man said, in a mild, quiet tone.

"Never think of going to Heaven!" exclaimed one of the most ardent of the company, his voice warming with indignation. "Are you a heathen?"

"I am one who is patiently striving to fill my allotted place in life," replied the old man, as calmly as before.

"And have you no hopes beyond the grave?" asked the last speaker.

"If I live right here, all will be right there." The old man pointed upward. "I have no anxieties about the future—no impatience—no ardent longings to pass away and be at rest, as some of you have said. I already enjoy as much of Heaven as I am prepared to enjoy, and this is all that I can expect throughout eternity. You all, my friends, seem to think that men come into Heaven when they die. You look ahead to death with pleasure, because then you think you will enter the happy state you anticipate—or rather place; for it is clear you regard Heaven as a place full of delights, prepared for those who may be fitted to become inhabitants thereof. But in this you are mistaken. If you do not enter Heaven before you die, you will never do so afterward. If Heaven be not formed within you, you will never find it out of you—you will never come into it."

These remarks offended the company, and they spoke harshly to the old man, who made no reply, but arose and retired, with a sorrowful expression on his face. He went forth and resumed his daily occupations, and pursued them diligently. Those who had been assembled with him, also went forth—one to his farm, another to his merchandize, each one forgetting all he had thought about Heaven and its felicities, and only anxious to serve natural life and get gain. Heaven was above the world to them, and, therefore, while in the world, they could only act upon the principle that governed the world; and prepare for Heaven by pious acts on the Sabbath. There was no other way to do, they believed—to attempt to bring religion down into life would only, in their view, desecrate it, and expose it to ridicule and contempt.

The old man, to whom allusion has been made, kept a store for the sale of various useful articles; those of the pious company who needed these articles as commodities of trade, or for their own use, bought of him, because they believed that he would sell them only what was of good quality. One of the most ardent of these came into the old man's store one day, holding a small package in his hand; his eye was restless, his lip compressed, and he seemed struggling to keep down a feeling of excitement.[14]

"Look at that," he said, speaking with some sternness, as he threw the package on the old man's counter.

The package was taken up, opened, and examined.

"Well?" said the old man, after he had made the examination, looking up with a steady eye and a calm expression of countenance.

"Well? Don't you see what is the matter?"

"I see that this article is a damaged one," was replied.

"And yet you sold it to me for good." The tone in which this was said implied a belief that there had been an intention of wrong.

A flush warmed the pale cheek of the old man at this remark. He examined the sample before him more carefully, and then opened a barrel of the same commodity and compared its contents with the sample. They agreed. The sample from which he had bought and by which he had sold was next examined—this was in good condition and of the best quality.

"Are you satisfied?" asked the visitor with an air of triumph.

"Of what?" the old man asked.

"That you sold me a bad article for a good one."

"Intentionally?"

"You are the best judge. That lies with God and your own conscience."

"Be kind enough to return every barrel you purchased of me, and get your money."

There was a rebuke in the way this was said, which was keenly felt. An effort was made to soften the aspersion tacitly cast upon the old man's integrity, but it was received without notice.

In due time the damaged article was brought back, and the money which had been paid for it returned.

"You will not lose, I hope?" said the merchant, with affected sympathy.

"I shall lose what I paid for the article."

"Why not return it, as I have done?"

"The man from whom I purchased is neither honest nor responsible, as I have recently learned. He left the city last week in no very creditable manner, and no one expects to see him back again."

"That is hard; but I really don't think you ought to lose."

"The article is not merchantable. Loss is, therefore, inevitable."

"You can, of course, sell at some price."

"Would it be right to sell, at any price, an article known to be useless—nay, worse than useless, positively injurious to any one who might use it?"

"If any one should see proper to buy from you the whole lot, knowing that it was injured, you would certainly sell. For instance, if I were to offer you two cents a pound for what I bought from you at six cents, would you not take me at my offer?"

"Will you buy at that price?"

"Yes. I will give you two cents."

"What would you do with it?"

"Sell it again. What did you suppose I would do with it? Throw it in the street?"

"To whom would you sell?"

"I'd find a purchaser."

"At an advance?"

"A trifle."

The inquiries of the old man created a suspicion that he wished to know who was to be the second purchaser, in order that he might go to him and get a better price than was offered. This was the cause of the brief answers given to his questions. He clearly comprehended what was passing in the other's mind, but took no notice of it.

"For what purpose would the individual who purchased from you buy?" he pursued.

"To sell again."

"At a further advance, of course?"

"Certainly."

"And to some one, in all probability, who would be deceived into purchasing a worthless article."

"As likely as not; but with that I have no concern. I sell it for what it is, and ask only what it is worth."

"Is it worth anything?"

"Why—yes—I can't say—no." The first words were uttered with hesitation; the last one with a decided emphasis. "But then it has a market value, as every article has."

"I cannot sell it to you, my friend," said the old man firmly.

"Why not?" I am sure you can't do better."

"I am not willing to become a party in wronging my neighbors. That is the reason. The article has no real value, and it would be wrong for me to take even a farthing per pound for it. You might sell it at an advance, and the purchaser from you at a still further advance, but some one would be cheated in the end, for the article never could be used."

"But the loss would be divided. It isn't right that one man should bear all. In the end it would be distributed amongst a good many, and the loss fall lightly upon each."

The good old man shook his head. "My friend," he said, laying his hand gently upon his arm—"Not very long since I heard you indulging the most ardent anticipations of Heaven. You expected to get there one of these days. Is it by acts of over-reaching your neighbor that you expect to merit Heaven? Will becoming a party to wrong make you more fitted for the company of angels who seek the good of others, and love others more than themselves? I fear you are deceiving yourself. All who come into Heaven love God: and I would ask with one of the apostles, 'If a man love not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?' You have much yet to learn, my friend. Of that true religion by which Heaven is formed in man, you have not yet learned the bare rudiments."

There was a calm earnestness in the manner of the old man, and an impressiveness in the tone of his voice, that completely subdued his auditor. He felt rebuked and humbled, and went away more serious than he had come. But though serious, his mind was not free from anger, his self-love had been too deeply wounded.

After he had gone away, the property about which so much had been said, was taken and destroyed as privately as it could be done. The fact, however,[15] could not be concealed. A friend of a different order from the pious one last introduced, inquired of the old man why he had done this. His answer was as follows:

"No man should live for himself alone. Each one should regard the common good, and act with a view to the common good. If all were to do so, you can easily see that we should have Heaven upon earth, from whence, alas! it has been almost entirely banished. Our various employments are means whereby we can serve others—our own good being a natural consequence. If the merchant sent out his ships to distant parts to obtain the useful commodities of other countries, in order to benefit his fellow citizens, do you not see that he would be far happier when his ships came in laden with rich produce, than if he had sought only gain for himself? And do you not also see that he would obtain for himself equal, if not greater advantages. If the builder had in view the comfort and convenience of his neighbors while erecting a house, instead of regarding only the money he was to receive for his work, he would not only perform that work more faithfully, and add to the common stock of happiness, but would lay up for himself a source of perennial satisfaction. He would not, after receiving the reward of his labor in a just return of this world's goods, lose all interest in the result of that labor; but would, instead, have a feeling of deep interior pleasure whenever he looked at a human habitation erected by his hands, arising from a consciousness that his skill had enabled him to add to the common good. The tillers of the soil, the manufacturers of its products into useful articles, the artisans of every class, the literary and professional man, all would, if moved by a regard for the welfare of the whole social body, not only act more efficiently in their callings, but would derive therefrom a delight now unimagined except by a very few. Believing thus, I could not be so blind as not to see that the only right course for me to pursue was to destroy a worthless and injurious commodity, rather than sell it at any price to one who would, for gain, either himself defraud his neighbor, or aid another in doing it. The article was not only useless, it was worse than useless. How, then, could I, with a clear conscience sell it? No—no, my friend. I am not afraid of poverty; I am not afraid of any worldly ill—but I am afraid of doing wrong to my neighbors; or of putting it in the power of any one else to do wrong. As I have said before, if every man were to look to the good of the whole, instead of turning all his thoughts in upon himself, his own interests would be better served and he would be far happier."

"That is a beautiful theory," remarked the friend, "but never can be realized in actual life. Men are too selfish. They would find no pleasure in contemplating the enjoyments of others, but would, rather, be envious of others' good. The merchant, so little does he care for the common welfare, that unless he receives the gain of his adventures, he will let his goods perish in his ware-house—to distribute them, even to the suffering, would not make him happier. And so with the product of labor in all the various grades of society. Men turn their eyes inward upon the little world of self, instead of outward upon the great social world. Few, if any, understand that they are parts of a whole, and that any disease in any other part of that whole, must affect the whole, and consequently themselves. Were this thoroughly understood, even selfishness would lead men to act less selfishly. We should indeed have Heaven upon earth if your pure theories could be brought out into actual life."

"Heaven will be found nowhere else by man," was replied to this.

"What!" said the friend, in surprise. "Do you mean to say that there is no Heaven for the good who bravely battle with evil in this life? Is all the reward of the righteous to be in this world?"

One of the pious company, at first introduced, came up at this moment, and hearing the last remark, comprehended, to some extent, its meaning. He was one who hoped, from pious acts of prayer, fastings, and attendance upon all the ordinances of the church, to get to Heaven at last. In the ordinary pursuits of life he was eager for gain, and men of the world dealt warily with him—they had reason; for he separated his religious from his business life.

"A most impious doctrine," he said, with indignant warmth. "Heaven upon earth! A man had better give all his passions the range, and freely enjoy the world, if there is to be no hereafter. Pain, and sorrow, and self-denial make a poor kind of Heaven, and these are all the Christian man meets here. Far better to live while we do live, say I, if our Heaven is to be here."

"What makes Heaven, my friend?" calmly asked the old man.

"Happiness. Freedom from care, and pain, and sorrow, and all the ills of this wretched life—to live in the presence of God and sing his praises forever—to make one of the blessed company who, with the four-and-twenty elders forever bow before the throne of God and the Lamb—to have rest, and peace, and unspeakable felicity forever."

"How do you expect to get into Heaven? How do you expect to unlock the golden gates of the New Jerusalem?" pursued the old man.

"By faith," was the prompt reply. "Faith unlocks these gates."

The old man shook his head, and turning to the individual with whom he had first been conversing, remarked—

"You asked me if I meant to say that there was no Heaven for the good who bravely battle with evil in this life? If all the reward of the righteous was to be in this world? God forbid! For then would I be of all men most miserable. What I said was, that Heaven would be found no where else but in this world, by man. Heaven must be entered into here, or it never can be entered into when men die."

"You speak in a strange language," said the individual who had joined them, in a sneering tone. "No one can understand what you mean. Certainly I do not."

"I should not think you did," quietly replied the[16] old man. "But I will explain my meaning more fully—perhaps you will be able to comprehend something of what I say. Men talk a great deal about Heaven, but few understand what it means. All admit that in this life they must prepare for Heaven; but nearly all seem to think that this preparation consists in the doing of something as a means by which they will be entitled to enter Heaven after death, when there will be a sudden and wonderful change in all their feelings and perceptions."

"And is not that true?" asked the one who had previously spoken.

"I do not believe that it is, in the commonly understood sense."

"And pray what do you believe?"

"I believe that all in heavenly societies are engaged in doing good, and that heavenly delight is the delight which springs from a gratified love of benefiting others. And I also believe, that the beginning of Heaven with every one is on this earth, and takes place when he first makes the effort to renounce self and seek from a true desire to benefit them, the good of others. If this coming into Heaven, as I call it, does not take place here, it can never take place, for 'As the tree falls so it lies.' Whatever is a man's internal quality when he dies that it must remain forever. If he have been a lover of self, and sought only his own good, he will remain a lover of self in the next life. But, if he have put away self-love from his heart and shunned the evils to which it would prompt him, as sins, then he comes into Heaven while still upon earth, and when he lays aside his mortal body, his heavenly life is continued. Thus you can see, that if a man do not find Heaven while in this world, he will never find it in the next. He must come into heavenly affections here, or he will never feel their warmth hereafter. Hundreds and thousands live on from day to day, thinking only of themselves, and caring only for themselves, who insanely cherish the hope that they shall get into Heaven at last. Some of these are church-going people, and partakers of its ordinances; while others expect, some time before they die, to become pious, and thus, by a 'saving faith,' secure an entrance into Heaven. Their chances of finding Heaven, at last, are about equal. And if they should be permitted to come into a heavenly society they would soon seek to escape from it. Where all were unselfish, how could one who was utterly selfish dwell? Where all sought the good of others, how could one who cared simply for his own good, remain and be happy? It could not be. If you wish to enter Heaven, my friend, you must bring heavenly life into your daily occupations."

"How can that be? Religion is too tender a plant for the world."

"Your error is a common one," replied the old man, "and arises from the fact that you do not know what religion is. Mere piety is not religion. There is a life of charity as well as a life of piety, and the latter without the former is like sounding brass and tinkling cymbal."

"All know that," was replied.

"All profess to know it, but all do not know what is meant by charity."

"It is love. That every Christian man admits."

"It is love for the neighbor in activity; not a mere idle emotion of the heart. Now, how can a man best promote the good of his neighbor?—love, you know, always seeks the good of its object; in no way, it is clear, so well as by faithfully and diligently performing the duties of his office, no matter what it may be. If a judge, let him administer justice with equity and from a conscientious principle; if a physician, a lawyer, a soldier, a merchant, or an artisan, let him with all diligence do the works that his hands find to do, not merely for gain, but because it is his duty to serve the public good in that calling by which he can most efficiently do it. If he act from this high motive, from this religious principle, all that he does will be well and faithfully done. No wrong to his neighbor can result from his act. True charity is not that feeling which prompts merely to the bestowment of worldly goods for the benefit of others—in fact, true charity has very little to do with alms-giving and public benefactions. It is not a mere 'love for the brethren' only, as many religious denominations think, but it is a love that embraces all mankind, and regards good as its brother wherever and in whomever it is seen."

"That every one admits."

"Admission and practice, my friend, are not always found walking in the same path. But I am not at all sure that every one admits that charity consists in a man's performing his daily uses in life with justice and judgment. By most minds charity, as well as religion, is viewed as separate from the ordinary business of man; while the truth is, there can be neither religion nor charity apart from a man's business life. If he be not charitable and religious here, he has neither charity nor religion; if he love not his neighbor whom he hath seen; if he do not deal justly and conscientiously with his neighbor whom he hath seen, how can he love God, or act justly and conscientiously toward God whom he hath not seen? How blind and foolish is more than half of mankind on this subject! They seem to think, that if they only read the Bible and attend to the ordinances of the church, and lead very pious lives on the Sabbath, that this service will be acceptable to God, and save them; while, at the same time, in their business pursuits, they seek to gain this world's goods so eagerly, that they trample heedlessly upon the rights and interests of all around them; in fact, act from the most selfish, and, consequently, infernal principles. You call R—— a very pious man, do you not?"

"I believe him to be so. We are members of the same church, and I see a good deal of him. He is superintendent of our Sabbath-school, and is active in all the various secular uses of the church."

"Do you know any thing of his business life?"

"No."

"I do. Men of the world call him a shark, so eager is he for gain. He will not steal, nor commit murder, nor break any one of the commandments so far as the laws of the state recognize these divine laws[17] to be laws of common society. But, in his heart, and in act, so far as the law cannot reach him, he violates them daily. He will overreach you in a bargain, and think it all right. If your business comes in contact with his, he will use every means in his power to break you down, even to the extent of secretly attacking your credit. He will lend his money on usury, and when he has none to lend, will play the jackal to some money-lion, and get a large share of the spoil for himself. And further, if you differ in faith from him, in his heart will send you to hell with as much pleasure as he would derive from cheating you out of a dollar."

"You are too severe on R——. I cannot believe him to be what you say."

"A man's reputation among business men gives the true impression of his character, for, in business, the eagerness with which men seek their ends causes them to forget their disguises. Go and ask any man who knows R—— in business, and he will tell you that he is a sharper. That if you have any dealings with him you must keep your eyes open. I could point you to dozens of men who are as pious as he is on the Sabbath, who, in their ordinary life are no better than swindlers. The Christian religion is disgraced by thousands of such, who are far worse than those who never saw the inside of a church."

"I am afraid that you, in the warmth of your indignation against false professors, are led into the extreme of setting aside all religion; or of making it to consist alone in mere honesty and integrity of character—your moral man is all; it is morality that opens Heaven. Now mere morality, mere good works, are worth nothing, and cannot bring a man into Heaven."

"There is a life of piety, and a life of charity, my friend, as I have before said," replied the old man, "and they cannot be separated. The life of charity regards man, and the life of piety God. A man's prayers, and fastings, and pious duties on the Sabbath are nothing, if love to the neighbor, showing itself in a faithful performance of all life's varied uses that come within his sphere of action, is not operative through the week, vain hopes are all those which are built upon so crumbling a foundation as the mere life of piety. Morality, as you call it, built upon man's pride, is of little use, but morality, which is based upon a sincere desire to do good, is worth a thousand prayers from the lips of a man who inwardly hates his neighbor."

"Then I understand you to mean that religious, or pious duties are useless"—was remarked with a good deal of bitterness.

"I said," was mildly returned, "that the life of piety and the life of charity could not be separated. If a man truly loves his neighbor and seeks his good, he will come into heavenly states of mind, and will have his heart elevated, and from a consciousness that every good and perfect gift comes from God, worship him in a thankful spirit. His life of piety will make one with his life of charity. The Sabbath to him will be a day of true, not forced, spiritual life. He will rest from all natural labors, and gain strength from that rest to recommence those labors in a true spirit."

Much more was said, that need not be repeated here. The closing remarks of the old man were full of truth. It will do any one good to remember them:

"Our life is twofold. We have a natural life and a spiritual life," he said. "Our natural life delights in external things, and our spiritual life in things internal. The first regards the things of time and sense, the latter involves states and qualities of the soul. Heaven is a state of mutual love from a desire to benefit others, and whenever man's spiritual life corresponds with the life of Heaven, he is in Heaven so far as his spirit is concerned, notwithstanding his body still remains upon the earth. His heavenly life begins here, and is perfected after death. If, therefore, a man does not enter Heaven here, he cannot enter it when he dies. His state of probation is closed, and he goes to the place for which he is prepared. The means whereby man enters Heaven here, are very simple. He need only shun as sin every thing that would in any way injure his neighbors, either naturally or spiritually, and look above for the power to do this. This will effect an entrance through the straight gate. After that, the way will be plain before him, and he will walk in it with a daily increasing delight."

A love for amusement is one of those national peculiarities of the French people which neither time nor situation will ever eradicate, for, be their lot cast where it may, amid the brilliant salons of Paris, or on the outskirts of civilization on the western continent, they will set apart seasons for innocent mirth, in which they enter into its spirit with a joyousness totally devoid of calculation or of care. I love this trait in their character, because, perhaps, my own spirits incline to the volatile. I like not that puritanical coldness of intercourse which acts upon men as the winter winds do upon the surface of the mountain streams, freezing them into immovable propriety; and less do I delight in that festivity where calculation seems to wait on merriment. Joy at such a board can never rise to blood heat, for the jingle in the mind of cent. per cent., which rises above the constrained mirth of the assembly, will hold the guests so anchored to the consideration of profit and loss, that in vain they spread a free sail—the tide of gayety refuses to float their barks from the shoal beside which they are moored. In their seasons of gayety the French are philosophers, for while they imbibe the mirth they discard the wassail, and wine instead of being the body of their feasts, as with other nations, it is but the spice used to add a flavor to the whole. I know not that these remarks of mine have aught to do with my story, but I throw them out by way of a prelude to—some will say excuse for—what may follow.

In the winter of 1830 it was my good fortune to be the guest of an old French resident upon the north-western frontier, and while enjoying his hospitality I had many opportunities of mingling with the habitans of Detroit, a town well known as one of the early French settlements on the American continent. At the period of which I write, the stranger met a warm welcome in the habitation of the simple residents—time, progress and speculation, I am told, have somewhat marred those friendly feelings. The greedy adventurer, by making his passport to their hospitality a means of profit, has planted distrust in their bosoms, and the fire of friendship no longer flashes up at the sound of an American's voice beneath their roof. To the all absorbing spirit of Mammon be ascribed the evil change.

While residing with my friend Morell, I received many invitations to join sleighing parties upon the ice, which generally terminated on the floor of some old settler's dwelling upon the borders of the Detroit, Rouge, or Ecorse rivers; where, after a merry jaunt over the frozen river, we kept the blood in circulation by participating in the pleasures of the dance. At one of these parties upon the Rouge I formed two very interesting acquaintances, one of them a beautiful girl named Estelle Beaubien, the other, Victor Druissel. Estelle was one of those dark-eyed lively brunettes formed by nature for the creation of flutterings about the hearts of the sterner sex. She was full of naive mischief, and coquetry, and having been petted into imperial sway by the flattery of her courtiers, she punished them by wielding her sceptre with autocratic despotism—tremble, heart, that owned her sway yet dared disobey her behests! In the dance she was the nimblest, in mirth the most gleeful, and in beauty peerless. Victor Druissel was a tall, dark haired young man, of powerful frame, intelligent countenance, quiet easy manners, and possessed of a bold, dark eye, through which the quick movings of his impassioned nature were much sooner learned than through his words. He appeared to be devoid of fear, and in either expeditions of pleasure or daring, with a calmness almost unnatural he led the way. He loved Estelle with all that fervor so inherent in men of his peculiar temperament, and when others fluttered around her, seemingly winning lasting favor in her eyes, he would vainly try to hide the jealousy of his nature.

When morning came Druissel insisted that I should take a seat in his cutter, as he had come alone. He would rather have taken Estelle as his companion to the city, but her careful aunt, who always accompanied her, would not trust herself behind the heels of the prancing pair of bays harnessed to Victor's sliding chariot. The sleighs were at length filled with their merry passengers, and my companion shouting allons! led the cavalcade. We swept over the chained tide like the wind, our horses' hoofs beating time to the merry music of their bells, and our laughter ringing out on the clear, cold air, free and unrestrained as the thoughts of youth.

"I like this," said Victor, as he leaned back and nestled in the furry robes around us. "This is fun in the old-fashioned way; innocent, unconstrained, and full of real enjoyment. A fashionable ball is all well enough in its way, but give me a dance where there is no formality continually reminding me of my 'white kids,' or where my equanimity is never disturbed by missing a figure; there old Time seldom croaks while he lingers, for the heart merriment makes him forget his mission."

On dashed our steeds over the glassy surface of the river, and soon the company we had started with was left far behind. We in due time reached Detroit, and as I leaped from the sleigh at the door of my friend's residence, Victor observed:

"To-morrow night we are invited to a party at my uncle Yesson's, at the foot of Lake St. Clair, and if you will accept a seat with me, I shall with pleasure be your courier. I promise you a night of rare enjoyment."

"You promise then," said I, "that Estelle Beaubien will be there."[19]

He looked calmly at me for a moment.

"What, another rival?" he exclaimed. "Now, by the mass one would think Estelle was the only fair maiden on the whole frontier. Out of pity for the rest of her sex I shall have to bind her suddenly in the bonds of Hymen, for while she is free the young men will sigh after no other beauty, and other maids must pine in neglect."

"You flatter yourself," said I. "Give me but a chance, and I will whisper a lay of love in the fair beauty's ear that will obliterate the image you have been engraving on her heart. She has listened to you, no other splendid fellow being by, but when I enter the lists look well to your seat in her affections, for I am no timid knight when a fair hand or smile is to be won."

"Come on," cried he, laughing, "I scorn to break lance with any other knight. The lists shall be free to you, the fair Estelle shall be the prize, and I dare you to a tilt at Cupid's tourney."

With this challenge he departed, and as his yet unwearied steeds bore him away, I could hear his laugh of conscious triumph mingling with the music of his horses' bells.

After a troubled sleep that day, I awoke to a consciousness of suffering. I had lost my appetite, was troubled with vertigo, and obstructed breathing, which were sure indications that the sudden change from heated rooms to the clear, cold air, sweeping over the ice-bound river, had given me a severe influenza. My promise of a tilt with Victor, or participation in further festivity, appeared abrogated, for a time at least. I kept my bed during the day, and at night applied the usual restoratives. Sleep visited my pillow, but it was of that unrefreshing character which follows disease. I tossed upon my couch in troubled dreams, amid which I fancied myself a knight of the olden time, fighting in the lists for a wreath or glove from a tourney queen. In the contest I was conscious of being overthrown, and raised myself up from the inglorious earth upon which I had been rolled, a bruised knight from head to heel. When I awoke in the morning the soreness of every joint made me half think, for a moment, that I had suffered some injury while in sleeping unconsciousness; but, waking recollection assigned a natural cause, and I bowed my fevered head to the punishment of my imprudence. An old and dignified physician was summoned to my bed-side, who felt my pulse, ordered confinement to my room, and the swallowing of a horrible looking potion, which nearly filled a common-sized tumbler. A few days care, he said, would restore me, and with his own hands he mixed my dose, placed it beside me upon a table, and departed. I venerate a kind and skillful physician; but, like all the rest of the human family, his nauseous doses I abhor. I looked at the one before me until, in imagination, I tasted its ingredients. In my fevered vision the vessel grew into a monster goblet, and soon after it assumed the shape of a huge glass tun. Methought I commenced swallowing, fearful that if I longer hesitated it would grow more vast, and then it seemed as if the dose would never be exhausted, and that my body would not contain the whole of the dreadful compound. I dropped off again from this half-dreamy state into the oblivion of deep sleep, and remained unconscious of every thing until awoke in the evening by the chiming of bells beneath my window. I had scarcely changed my position before Victor, wrapped in his fur-lined coat, walked into my room.

"Why, my dear fellow," cried he, on seeing me nestled beneath the cover, with a towel round my head by way of a night-cap, "what is all this? Nothing serious, I hope?"

"Oh no," answered I, "only sore bones, and an embargo on the respiratory organs. That mixture"—calling his attention to the tumbler—"will no doubt set all right again."

"Pah!" he exclaimed, twisting his face as if he had tasted it, "I hope you don't resort to such restoratives."

"So goes the doctor's orders," said I.

"Oh, a pest on his drugs," says Victor. "Why didn't you call me in? I'm worth a dozen regular practitioners in such cases, especially where I am the patient. Come, up and dress, and while you are about it I will empty this potion out of the window, we will then take a seat behind the 'tinklers,' and before the night is over, I will put you through a course of exercise which has won more practice among the young than ever the wisest practitioner has been able to obtain for his most skillfully concocted healing draughts."

"I can't, positively, Victor," said I. "It would cost me my life."

"Then I will lend you one of mine, without interest," said he. "Along you must go, any how, so up at once. Think, my dear boy, of the beauty gathering now in the old mansion at the foot of Lake St. Clair."

"Think," said I, "of my sore bones."

"And then," he continued, unmindful of my remark, "think of the dash along the ice, the moon lighting your pathway, while a cluster of star-bright eyes wait to welcome your coming."

"Oh, nonsense" said I, "and by that I mean your romance. If through my imprudence I should have the star of my existence quenched, the lustre of those eyes would fail in any effort to light me up again, and that is a matter worth consideration."

Even while I talked to him I felt my health rapidly improving.

"What would the doctor say, Victor," inquired I, "if he came here and found me out? Nothing would convince him that it wasn't a hoax, shamelessly played off upon his old age, and he would never forgive me."

"Not so," says Victor, "you can take my prescription without his knowing it, and it is as follows: First and foremost, toss his medicine out of the window, visit uncle's with me and dance until morning, get back by daylight, go to bed and take a nap before he comes, and take my word for it he will pronounce your improved state the effect of his medicine."

"It would be madness, and I cannot think of it," replied I, half disposed at the same time to yield.[20]

"Then I pronounce you no true knight," said he, "I will report to Estelle the challenge that passed between us, and be sure she will set you down in her memory as a timid gentleman!"

"Oh, stop," said I, "and I will save you that sneer. I know that out of pure dread of my power you wish to kill me off; but I will go, nevertheless, if it is to death, in the performance of my duty."

"What duty do you speak of," inquired he.

"Taking the conceit out of a coxcomb," said I.

"Bravo!" he shouted, "your blood is already in circulation, and there are hopes of you. I will now look to the horses." Indulging in a quiet laugh at his success, he descended the staircase.

It was a work of some labor to perform the toilet for my journey, but at length Dr. B.'s patient, well muffled up, placed himself beneath a load of buffalo robes, and reversing the doctor's orders, which were peremptory to keep quiet, he was going like mad, in the teeth of a strong breeze, over the surface of Detroit river.

The moon was yet an hour high above the dark forest line of the American shore, and light fleecy clouds were chasing each other across her bright disc, dimming her rays occasionally, but not enough to make traveling doubtful. A south wind swept down from the lake, along the bright line of the river, but it was not the balmy breeze which southern poets breathe of in their songs. True it had not the piercing power of the northern blast, but in passing over those frozen regions it had encountered its adversary and been chilled by his embrace. It was the first breath of spring combating with the strongly posted forces of old winter, and as they mingled, the mind could easily imagine it heard the roar of elemental strife. Now the south wind would sound like the murmur of a myriad of voices, as it rustled and roared through the dark woods lining the shore, and then it would pipe afar off as if a reserve were advancing to aid in holding the ground already occupied; anon the echo of a force would be heard close in by the bluff bordering the stream, and in a moment more, it was sweeping with all its strength and pride of power down the broad surface of the glittering ice, as if the rightfulness of its invasion scorned resistance. Sullen old winter with his frosty beard and snow-wreathed brow, sat with calm firmness at his post, sternly resolved to yield only when his power melted before the advancing tide of the enemy.

"Our sport on the ice is nearly at an end," remarked Victor. "This south wind, if it continues a few days, will set our present pathway afloat. Go along!" he shouted, excitedly, to his horses, following the exclamation by the lash of his whip. They dashed ahead with the speed of lightning, while the ice cracked in a frightful manner beneath the runners of our sleigh for several rods. I held my breath with apprehension, but soon we were speeding along as before.

"That was nigh being a cold bath," quietly observed Victor.

"What do you mean?" inquired I.

"Did you not see the air-hole we just passed?" he inquired in turn.

"It was at least ten yards long, and we came within six inches of being emptied into it before I noticed the opening."

I could feel my pores open—moisture was quickly forced to the surface of my skin at this announcement, and I inwardly breathed a prayer of thanks for our escape.

But a short time elapsed ere the hospitable mansion of Victor's uncle appeared in sight, with lights dancing from every window, and our good steeds, like couriers of the air, scudded over the polished surface toward these pleasant beacons. We were soon able to descry forms flitting before the window, and as we turned up the road leading from the lake to the dwelling, Victor whispered—

"I recognize the person of Estelle standing by yonder window, remember our challenge."

"I shall not forget it," said I, as we drew up before the portal.

Consigning our panting steeds to two negro boys, and divesting ourselves of extra covering, we were soon mingling in the "merrie companie." Estelle was there in all her beauty, her dark eyes beaming mischief, her graceful actions inviting attention, and her merry laugh infecting all with its gleeful cadences. Victor was deep in the toils, and willingly he yielded to the bondage of the gay coquette. Now she smiled winningly upon him, and again laughed at his tender speeches. He besought her to dance with him, and she refused, but with such an artless grace, such witching good humor, and playful cruelty, that he could not feel offended. I addressed her and she turned away from him. I had not presumption enough to suppose I could win a maiden's heart where he was my rival, but I thought that, aided by the coquetry of Estelle, I could help to torture the victim—and I set about it; nay, further, I confess that as she leaned her little ear, which peeped out from a cluster of dark curls, toward my flattering whisper, I fancied that she inclined it with pleasure; but, then, the next moment my hopes were dissipated, for she as fondly smiled on my rival.

A flourish of the music, and with one accord the company moved forward to the dance. Estelle consented to be my partner. Victor was not left alone, but his companion in the set might as well have been, for she frequently had to call his attention to herself and the figure—his eye was continually wandering truant to the next set, where he was one moment scanning with a lover's jealousy a rival's enjoyment, and the next gazing with wrapt admiration upon the beautiful figure and graceful movements of his mistress. The set was ended, and the second begun—Victor being too slow in his request for her hand, she yielded it to another eager admirer. The third set soon followed, and laughingly she again took my arm. The fourth, and she was dancing with a stranger guest. As she wound through the mazes of the dance, arching her graceful neck with a proud motion, her eye, maliciously sportive, watched the workings of jealousy which clouded Victor's brow. He did not solicit her hand again, but stood with fixed eye and swelling throat, looking out upon the[21] lake. I rallied him upon his moodiness, and told him he did not bear defeat with philosophy.

"Your dancing," said he, "would win the admiration of an angel;" and his lip curled with a slight sneer.

I did not feel flattered much, that he attributed my success to my heels instead of my head, and I carelessly remarked that perhaps he felt inclined to test my superior powers in some other method. He looked at me firmly for a moment, his large, dark eye blazing, and then burst into a laugh.

"Yes," said he, "I should like to try a waltz with you upon the icy surface of the lake."

"Come on," said I, thoughtlessly, "any adventure that will cure you of conceit—you know that is my purpose here to-night."

Laughing at the remark, he led the way from the ball-room. I observed by Victor's eye and pale countenance, that he was chagrined at Estelle's treatment, and thought he was making an excuse to get out in the night air to cool his fevered passions.

"See," he said, when he descended, "there burns the torch of the Indian fishermen, far out on the lake—they are spearing salmon-trout—we will go see the sport."[2]

I looked out in the direction he indicated, and far away upon its glassy surface glimmered a single light, throwing its feeble ray in a bright line along the ice. The moon was down, and the broad expanse before us was wrapped in darkness, save this taper which shone through the clear, cold atmosphere.

"You are surely mad," said I, "to think of such an attempt."

"If the bare thought fills you with fear," he answered, "I have no desire for your company. The dance within, I see, is more to your mind."

Without regarding his sneer, I remarked that if he was disposed to play the madman, I was not afraid to become his keeper, it mattered not how far the fit took him.

"Come on, then," said he; and we started on our mad jaunt.

"Sam, have you a couple of saplings?" inquired Victor of the eldest negro boy.

"Yes, massa Victor, I got dem ar fixins; but what de lor you gemmen want wid such tings at de ball?"

"It is too hot in the ball-room," answered Victor; "myself and friend, therefore, wish to try a waltz on the ice."

"Yah, yah, h-e-a-h!" shouted the negro, wonderfully tickled at the novelty of the idea, "well, dat is a high kick, please goodness—guess you can't git any ob de ladies to try dat shine wid you, h-e-a-h!"

"We shall not invite them," said Victor, through his teeth.

"Well, dar is de poles, massa," said the negro, handing him a couple of saplings about twelve feet long. "You better hab a lantern wid you, too, else you can't see dat dance berry well."

"A good thought," said Victor; "give us the lantern."

It was procured, lighted, and together we descended the steep bluff to the lake's brink. He paused for a moment to listen—revelry sounded clearly out upon the air of night, nimble feet were treading gayly to the strains of sweet music, and high above both, yet mingling with them, was heard the merry laughter of the joyous guests. Ah, Victor, thought I, trout are not the only fish captured by brilliant lights; there is a pair dancing above, yonder, which even now is driving you to madness. I shrunk from the folly we were about to perpetrate, yet had not courage enough to dare my companion's sneer, and turn boldly back; vainly hoping he would soon tire of the exploit I followed on.

Running one pole through the ring of our lantern, and placing ourselves at each end, we took up our line of march for the light ahead. Victor seizing the end of the other sapling slid it before him to feel our way. At times the beacon would blaze up as if but an hundred yards ahead, and again it would sink to a spark, far away in the distance. The night wind was now sweeping down the lake in a tornado, sighing and laboring in its course as if pregnant with evil—afar off, at one moment, heard in a low whistle, and anon rushing around us like an army of invisible spirits, bearing us along with the whirl of their advance, and yelling a fearful war-cry in our ears. The beacon-light still beckoned us on. My companion, as if rejoicing in the fury of the tempest which roared around us, burst into a derisive laugh.

"Thunder would be fit music, now," said he, "for this pleasant little party"—and the words were scarcely uttered, ere a sound of distant thunder appeared to shake the frozen surface of the lake. The pole he was sliding before him, and of which he held but a careless grip, fell from his hands. He stooped to pick it up, but it was gone; and holding up our lantern to look for it, we beheld before us a wide opening in the ice, where the dark tide was ruffled into mimic waves by the breeze. Our sapling was floating upon its surface.

"This way," said Victor, bent in his spirit of folly to fulfill his purpose, and skirting the yawning pool, where the cold tide rolled many fathoms deep, we held on our way. We thus progressed nearly two miles, and yet the ignus fatuus which tempted us upon the mad journey shone as distant as ever. Our own feeble light but served to show, indistinctly, the dangers with which we were surrounded. I was young, and loved life; nay, I was even about to plead in favor of turning toward the shore that I might preserve it, when my companion, his eye burning with excitement, turned toward me, and raising his end of the sapling until the light of the lantern fell upon my face, remarked,

"You are pale—I am sorry I frightened you thus, we will return."

With a reckless pride that would not own my fears, even though death hung on my footsteps, I answered with a scornful laugh,

"Your own fears, and not mine, counsel you to such a proceeding."

"Say you so," says he, "then we will hold on[22] until we cross the lake;" and with a shout he pressed forward; bending my head to the blast, I followed.

I had often heard of the suddenness with which Lake St. Clair cast off its winter covering, when visited by a southern breeze; and whether the heat of my excitement, or an actual moderation of cold in the wind sweeping over us was the fact, I am unable to determine, but I fancied its puff upon my cheek had grown soft and balmy in its character; a few drops of rain accompanied it, borne along as forerunners of a storm. While we thus journeyed, a sound like the reverberation of distant thunder again smote upon our ears, and shook the ice beneath our feet. We suddenly halted.

"There is no mistaking that," said Victor. "The ice is breaking up—we will pursue this folly no further."

He had scarcely ceased speaking, when a report, like that of cannon, was heard in our immediate neighborhood, and a wide crevice opened at our very feet, through which the agitated waters underneath bubbled up. We leaped it, and rushed forward.

"Haste!" cried my companion, "there is sufficient time for us yet to reach the shore before the surface moves."

"Time, for us, Victor," replied I, "is near an end—if we ever reach the shore, it will be floating lifeless amid the ice."

"Courage," says he, "do not despond;" and seizing my arm, we moved with speed in the direction where lights streamed from the gay and pleasant mansion which we had so madly left. Ah, how with mingled hope and fear our hearts beats, as with straining eyes we looked toward that beacon. In an instant, even as we sped along, the ice opened again before us, and ere I could check my impetus, I was, with the lantern in my hand, plunged within the flood. My companion retained his hold of me, and with herculean strength he dragged me from the dark tide upon the frail floor over which we had been speeding. In the struggle, the lantern fell from my grasp, and sunk within the whirling waters.

"Great God!" exclaimed Victor, "the field we stand upon is moving!"—and so it was. The mass closed up the gap into which I had fallen; and we could hear the edges which formed the brink of the chasm, crushing and crumbling as they moved together in the conflict. We stood breathlessly clinging to each other, listening to the mad fury of the wind, and the awful roar of the ice which broke and surged around us. The wind moaned by us and above our heads like the wail of nature in an agony, while mingling with its voice could be distinctly heard the ominous reverberations which proclaimed a general breaking up of the whole surface of the lake. The wind and current were both driving the ice toward the Detroit river, and we could see by the lights on the shore that we were rapidly passing in that direction. A dark line, scarcely discernible, revealed where the distant shore narrowed into the straight; but the hope of ever reaching it died within me, as our small platform rose and sunk on the troubled waves.

While floating thus, held tightly in the grasp of my companion, his deep breathing fanning my cheek, I felt my senses gradually becoming wrapt with a sweet dream, and so quickly did it steal upon me, that in a few moments all the peril of our position was veiled from my mind, and I was reveling in a delightful illusion. I was floating upon an undulating field of ice, in a triumphal car, drawn by snow-white steeds, and in my path glittered a myriad gems of the icy north. My progress seemed to be as quiet as the falling of the snow-flake, and swift as the wind, which appeared drawn along with my chariot-wheels. To add to this dreamy delight, many forms of beauty, symmetrical as angels, with eyes radiant as the stars of night, floated around my pathway. Though their forms appeared superior to earth, the tender expression of their eyes was altogether human. Their ethereal forms were clad in flowing robes, white as the wintry drift; coronets of icy jewels circled their brows, and glittered upon their graceful necks; their golden hair floated upon the sportive wind, as if composed of the sun's bright rays, and the effect upon the infatuated gazer at these spirit-like creations, was a desire not to break the spell, lest they should vanish from before his entranced vision. To add to the charm of their power they burst into music wild as the elements, but yet so plaintively sweet, that the senses yielded up in utter abandon to its soothing swell. I had neither the power nor the wish to move, but under the influence of this ravishing dream, floated along in happy silence, a blest being, attended by an angel throng, whose voluptuous forms delighted, and whose pleasing voices lulled into all the joys of fancied elysium.

From this dream I was aroused to the most painful sensations. The pangs of death can bear no comparison to the agony of throwing off this sleep. Action was attended with torture, and every move of my blood seemed as if molten lead was coursing through my veins. My companion, by every means he could think of, was forcing me back to consciousness; but I clung with the tenacity of death to my sweet dream. He dashed my body upon our floating island; he pinched my flesh, fastened his fingers into my hair, and beat me into feeling with the power of his muscular arm. Slowly the figures of my dream began to change—my triumphal car vanished—dark night succeeded the soft light which had before floated around me, and the fair forms, which had fascinated my soul by their beauty, were now changed into furies, whose voices mingling in the howl of the elements, sounded like a wail of sorrow, or a chaunt of rage. They looked into my eyes with orbs lit by burning hatred, while they seemed to lash me with whips of the biting wind, until every fibre in my frame was convulsed with rage and madness. I screamed with anguish, and grasping the muscular form of my companion, amid the loud howl of the storm, amid the roar of the crushing ice, amid the gloom of dark night upon that uncertain platform of the congealed yet moving waters, I fought with him, and struggled for the mastery. I rained blows upon his body, and he[23] returned them with interest. I tried to plunge with him into the dark waters that were bubbling around us, but he held me back as if I were a child; and in impotent rage I wept at my weakness. Slowly our perilous situation again forced itself upon my mind. I became conscious that a platform, brittle as the thread of life, was all that separated me from a watery grave; and I fancied the wind was murmuring our requiem as it passed. Hope died within me; but not so my companion.

"Speak to me!" he cried; "arouse, and let me hear your voice! Shake off this stupor, or you are lost!"

"Why did you wake me?" I inquired; "while in that lethargy I was happy."

"While there is hope you should never yield to despair," said Victor. "I discovered you freezing in my arms. Come, arouse yourself more fully; Providence has designed us for another grave than the waters of Lake St. Clair, or ere this we would have been quietly resting in some of the chasms beneath. We are floating rapidly into the river, and will here find some chance to escape."

"Here, at last," answered I, despondingly, "we are likely to find our resting-place."

"Shake off this despondency!" exclaimed Victor, "it is unmanly. If we are to die, let it be in a struggle against death. We have now only to avoid being crushed between the fields of ice. Oh! that unfortunate lantern! if we had only retained it—but no matter, we will escape yet; aye, and have another dance among our friends in yonder old hospitable mansion. Courage!" he exclaimed, "see, lights are dancing opposite us upon the shore. Hark! I hear shouts."

A murmur, as of the expiring sound of a shout rose above the roar of the ice and waters—but it failed to arouse me. The lights, though, we soon plainly discerned; and on the bluff, at the very mouth of the river, a column of flame began to rise, which cast a lurid light far over the surface of the raging lake. Some persons stood at the edge of the flood waving lighted torches; and I thought from their manner that we were discovered.

"We are safe, thank God!" says Victor. "They have discovered us!"

Hope revived again within me, and my muscles regained their strength. We were only distant about one hundred yards from shore, and rapidly nearing it, when a scene commenced, which, for the wildly terrific, exceeded aught I had ever before beheld. The force of the wind and the current had driven vast fields of ice into the mouth of the river, where it now gorged; and with frightful rapidity, and a stunning noise, the ice began to pile up in masses of several feet in height, until the channel was entirely obstructed. The dammed-up waters here boiled and bubbled, seeking a passage, and crumbling the barrier which impeded their way, dashed against it, and over it, in the mad endeavor to rush onward. The persons seen a few moments before were driven up to the bluff; and they no sooner reached there than Victor and myself, struggling amid the breaking ice and the rising flood, gained the shore; but in vain did we seek a spot upon the perpendicular sides of the bluff, where, for an instant, we could rest from the struggle. We shouted to those above, and they hailed us with a cheer, flashed their torches over our heads—but they had no power to aid us, for the ground they stood upon was thirty feet above us. Even while we were thus struggling, and with our arms outstretched toward heaven, imploring aid, the gorge, with a sound like the rumbling of an earth-quake, broke away, and swept us along in its dreadful course. Now did it seem, indeed, as if we had been tempted with hope, only that we might feel to its full extent of poignancy the bitterness of absolute despair. I yielded in hopeless inactivity to the current; my companion, in the meantime, was separated from me—and I felt as if fate had singled out me, alone, as the victim; but, while thus yielding to despondency, Victor again appeared at my side, and held me within his powerful grasp. He seized me as I was about to sink through exhaustion, and dragging me after him, with superhuman strength he leaped across the floating masses of ice, recklessly and boldly daring the death that menaced us. We neared the shore where it was low; and all at once, directly before us, shot up another beacon, and a dozen torches flashed up beside it. The river again gorged below us, and the accumulating flood and ice bore us forward full fifty feet beyond the river's brink—as before, the tide again swept away the barrier, leaving us lying among the fragments of ice deposited by the retreating flood, which dashed on its course, foaming, and roaring, and flashing in the light of the blazing beacons. Locked in each other's arms, and trembling with excitement, we lay collecting our scattered senses, and endeavoring to divest us of the terrible thought that we were still at the mercy of the flood. Our friends, who had learned from the negroes the mad adventure we had started upon, now gathered around us, lifted us up from our prostrate position, and moved toward Yesson's mansion. Victor, who through the whole struggle had borne himself up with that firmness which scorns to shrink before danger, now yielded, and sunk insensible. The excitement was at an end, and the strong man had become a child. I, feeble in body, and lacking his energy in danger, now that the peril was past, felt a buoyancy and strength which I did not possess at starting out.

My companion was lifted up and borne toward his uncle's. No music sounded upon the air as we approached—no voice of mirth escaped from the portal, for all inside were hushed into grief—that grief which anticipates a loss but knows not the sum of it. Several who entered the mansion first, and myself among the number, announced the coming of Victor, who had fallen in a fainting fit; but they would not believe us—they supposed at once that we came to save them from the sudden shock of an abrupt announcement of his death, and Estelle, with a piercing cry, rushed toward the hall—those bearing his body were at the moment entering the house—rushing toward them she clung to his inanimate form, uttering the most poignant cries of anguish. A few restora[24]tives brought Victor to consciousness, and sweet were the accents of reproof which fell upon his ear with the first waking into life, for they betrayed to him the tender feelings of love which the fair Estelle had before concealed beneath her coquetry. While the tears of joy were bedewing her cheeks, on finding her lover safe, he like a skillful tactician pursued the advantage, and in a mock attitude of desperation threatened to rush out and cast himself amid the turbid waters of the lake, unless she at once promised to terminate his suspense by fixing the day of their marriage. The fair girl consented to throw around him, merely as she said for his preservation, the gentle authority of a wife, and I at once offered to seal a "quit claim" of my pretensions upon her rosy lips, but she preferred having Victor act as my attorney in the matter, and the tender negotiation was accordingly closed.

After partaking of a fragrant cup of Mocha, about the hour day was breaking, I started for home, and having arrived, I plunged beneath the blankets to rest my wearied body. Near noon I was awakened by the medical attendant feeling my pulse. On opening my eyes, the first impulse was to hide the neglected potions, which I had carelessly left exposed upon the table, but a glance partially relieved my fears about its discovery, for I had fortunately thrown my cravat over it and hid it from view. As Victor predicted, the doctor attributed the healthy state in which he found me entirely to his prescription, and following up its supposed good effect, with a repetition of his advice to keep quiet, he departed. I could scarcely suppress a smile in his presence. Little did he dream of the remedy which had banished my fever—cold baths and excitement had produced an effect upon me far more potent than drugs, either vegetable or mineral.

A month after the events here above mentioned, I made one of a gay assembly in that same old mansion at the foot of Lake St. Clair. It was Victor's wedding-night, about to be consummated where the confession was first won, and while he sat upon one side of a sofa holding his betrothed's hand, in all the joy of undisputed possession, I on the other gave her a description of the winter-spirits which hold their revel upon the ice of the lake. While she listened her eye kindled with excitement, and she clung unconsciously and with a convulsive shudder to the person of her lover.

"You are right, Estelle," said I, "hold him fast, or they will steal him away to their deep caves beneath the waters, where their dance is, to mortal, a dance of death."

Bidding me begone, for a spiteful croaker, who was trying out of jealousy to mar her happiness, she turned confidingly to the manly form beside her, and from the noble expression beaming from his eyes imbibed a fire which defied the whole spirit-world, so deep and so strong was their assurance of devoted affection. The good priest now bade them stand up, the words were spoken, the benediction bestowed, the bride and groom congratulated, and a general joy circled the company round.

The causes which led to, and the incidents which befel, a "night on the ice," I have endeavored faithfully to rehearse, and now let me add the pleasing sequel. Victor Druissel, folded in the embrace of beauty, now pillows his head upon a bosom as fond and true as ever in its wild pulsations of coquetry made a manly heart to ache with doubt.

Alphonse de Lamartine, the present Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of France, was born in 1792, at Saint Pont, near Mâcon, in the Department of the Saone and Loire. His true family name is De Prat; but he took the name of De Lamartine from his uncle, whose fortune he inherited in 1820. His father and uncle were both royalists, and suffered severely from the Jacobins during the revolution. Had they lived in Paris their heads might have fallen from the block, but even in the province they did not escape persecution—a circumstance which, from the earliest youth of Lamartine, made a deep and indelible impression on his mind. His early education he received at the College of Belley, from which he returned in 1809, at the age of 18 years.

The splendor of the empire under Napoleon had no attractions for him. Though, at that period, Napoleon was extremely desirous to reconcile some of the old noble families, and for that purpose employed confidential ladies and gentlemen to correspond with the exiles and to represent to them the nobility of sentiment, and the magnanimity of the emperor; Lamartine refused to enter the service of his country under the new régime. So far from taking an interest in the great events of that period, he devoted himself entirely to literary studies, and improved his time by perambulating Italy. The fall of Napoleon did not affect him, for he was no friend of the first revolution, (whose last representative Napoleon still continued to be, though he had tamed it;) and when, in 1814, the elder line of Bourbons was restored, Lamartine returned from Naples, and entered, the service of Louis XVIII., as an officer of the garde-du-corps. With the return of Napoleon from Elba he left the military service forever.

A contemporary of Chateaubriand, Delavigne and Beranger, he now devoted himself to that species of lyric and romantic poetry which at first exasperated the French critics, but, in a very short time, won for him the European appellation of "the French Schiller." His first poems, "Méditations Poétiques," which appeared in Paris in 1820, were received with ten times the bitter criticism that was poured out on Byron by the Scotch reviewers, but with a similar result; in less than two months a second edition was called for and published. The spirit of these poems is that of a deep but undefined religion, presentiments and fantastic dreams of another world, and the consecration of a noble and disinterested passion for the beau ideal of his youth, "Elvire," separated from him forever by the chilly hand of death. In the same year Lamartine became Secretary of the French Legation at Naples, and in 1822, Secretary of the Legation in London—Chateaubriand being at the time minister plenipotentiary.

But the author of the Génie du Christianism, les Martyrs, and Bonaparte et des Bourbons, "did not seem to have been much pleased with Lamartine, whom he treated with studied neglect, and afterward entirely forgot as minister of foreign affairs. Chateaubriand, shortly before taking the place of Mons. Decazes in London, had published his Mémoires, lettres, et pièces authentiques touchant la vie et la mort du Duc de Berri,"[3] and was then preparing to accompany the Duke of Montmorency, whom, in December 1822, he followed as minister of foreign affairs to the Congress of Verona. It is very possible that Chateaubriand, who was truly devoted to the elder branch of the Bourbons,[4] may at that time have discovered in Lamartine little of that political talent or devotion which could have recommended him to a diplomatic post. Chateaubriand was a man of positive convictions in politics and religion, while Lamartine, at that period, though far surpassing Chateaubriand in depth of feeling and imagination, had not yet acquired that objectiveness of thought and reflection which is indispensable to the statesman or the diplomatist.

After the dismission of Chateaubriand from the ministry, in July, 1824, Lamartine became Secretary to the French Legation at Florence. Here he wrote "Le dernier chant du pélerinage d'Harold," (the Last Song of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage,) which was published in Paris in 1825. Some allusions to Italy which occur in this poem, caused him a duel with Col. Pepe, a relation of General Pepe—who had commanded the Neapolitan Insurgents—in which he was severely wounded. In the same year he published [26]his "Chant du Sacre," (Chant of the Coronation,) in honor of Charles X., just about the time that his contemporary, Beranger, was preparing for publication his "Chansons inédittes," containing the most bitter sarcasm on Charles X., and for which the great Chansonnier was afterward condemned to nine month's imprisonment, and a fine of 10,000 francs. The career of Lamartine commences in 1830, after he had been made a member of the Academy, when Beranger's muse went to sleep, because, with Charles X.'s flight from France, he declared his mission accomplished. Delavigne, in 1829, published his Marino Falieri.

While in London, Lamartine married a young English lady, as handsome as spirituelle, who had conceived a strong affection for him through his poems, which she appreciated far better than his compeer, Chateaubriand, and requited with the true troubadour's reward. With the accession of Louis Philippe, Lamartine left the public service and traveled through Turkey, Egypt, and Syria. Here he lost his daughter, a calamity which so preyed on his mind that it would have incapacitated him for further intellectual efforts, had he not been suddenly awakened to a new sphere of usefulness. The town of Bergues, in the Department of the North, returned him, in his absence, to the Chamber of Deputies. He accepted the place, and was subsequently again returned from his native town, Mâcon, which he represented at the period of the last Revolution, which has called him to the head of the provisional government.

It is here worthy of remark, that Lamartine, from the commencement of his political career, did not take that interest in public affairs which seriously interferred with his poetical meditations; on the contrary, it was his muse which gave direction to his politics. He took a poetical view of religion, politics, morals, society, and state; the Chambers were to him but the medium for the realization of his beaux ideals. But it must not be imagined that Lamartine's beaux ideals had a distinct form, definitive outlines, or distinguishing lights and shades. His imagination has never been plastic, and his fancy was far better pleased with the magnitude of objects than with the artistical arrangement of their details. His conceptions were grand; but he possessed little power of elaboration; and this peculiarity of his intellect he carried from literature into politics.

Shortly after his becoming a member of the French Academy, he publishes his "Harmonies politiques et religieuses."[5] Between the publication of these "Harmonies," and the "Poetical Meditations," with which he commenced his literary career, lies a cycle of ten years; but no perceptible intellectual progress or developement. True, the first effusions of a poet are chiefly marked by intensity of feeling and depth of sentiment. (What a world of emotions does not pervade Schiller's "Robbers," or Goethe's "Götz of Berlichingen, with the iron hand!") but the subsequent productions must show some advancement toward objective reality, without which it is impossible to individualize even genius. To our taste, the "Meditations" are superior to his "Harmonies," in other words, we prefer his præludium to the concert. The one leaves us full of expectation, the other disappoints us. Lamartine's religion is but a sentiment; his politics at that time were but a poetical conception of human society. His religion never reached the culmination point of faith; his politics were never condensed into a system; his liquid sympathies for mankind never left a precipitate in the form of an absorbing patriotism. When his contemporary, Beranger, electrified the masses by his "Roi d'Yvetot," and "le Senateur," (in 1813,) Lamartine quietly mused in Naples, and in 1814 entered the body guard of Louis XVIII., when Cormenin resigned his place as counsellor of state, to serve as a volunteer in Napoleon's army.

Lamartine's political career did not, at first, interfere with his literary occupation, it was merely an agreeable pastime—a respite from his most ardent and congenial labors. In 1835 appeared his "Souvenirs, impressions, pensées et paysages pendant un voyage en Orient, &c."[6] This work, though written from personal observations, is any thing but a description of travels, or a faithful delineation of Eastern scenery or character. It is all poetry, without a sufficient substratum of reality—a dream of the Eastern world with its primitive vigor and sadness, but wholly destitute of either antiquarian research or living pictures. Lamartine gives us a picture of the East by candle-light—a high-wrought picture, certainly; but after all nothing but canvas. Shortly after this publication, there appeared his "Jocelyn, journal trouvé chez un curé de village,"[7] a sort of imitation of the Vicar of Wakefield; but with scarcely an attempt at a faithful delineation of character. Lamartine has nothing to do with the village parson, who may be a very ordinary personage; his priest is an ideal priest, who inculcates the doctrines of ideal Christianity in ideal sermons without a text. Lamartine seems to have an aversion to all positive forms, and dislikes the dogma in religion as much as he did the principles of the Doctrinaires. It would fetter his genius or oblige it to take a definite direction, which would be destructive to its essence.

As late as in 1838 Lamartine published his "La chute d'un age."[8] This is one of his poorest productions, though exhibiting vast powers of imagination and productive genius. The scene is laid in a chaotic antediluvian world, inhabited by Titans, and is, perhaps, descriptive of the author's mind, full of majestic imagery, but as yet undefined, vague, and without an object worthy of its efforts. Lamartine's time had not yet come, though he required but a few years to complete the fiftieth anniversary of his birth.

The year following, in 1839, he published his "Recueillements poétiques," which must be looked upon as the commencement of a new era in his life. Mahomed was past forty when he undertook to establish a new religion, and built upon it a new and powerful empire; Lamartine was nearly fifty when he left the fantastic for the real; and from the inspiration without an object, returned to the only real poetry in this world—the life of man. Lamartine, who until that period had been youthful in his conceptions, and wild and bizarre in his fancy, did not, as Voltaire said of his countrymen, pass "from childhood to old age," but paused at a green manhood, with a definite purpose, and the mighty powers of his mind directed to an object large enough to afford it scope for its most vigorous exercise. His muse was now directed to the interests of humanity; he was what the French call un poete humanitaire.

Thus far it was proper for us to follow the life of the poet to understand that of the statesman, orator, and tribune. Men like Lamartine must be judged in their totality, not by single or detached acts of their lives. Above all men it is the poet who is a self-directing agent, whose faculties receive their principal impulse from within, and who stamps his own genius on every object of his mental activity. Schiller, after writing the history of the most remarkable period preceding the French Revolution, "the thirty years' war," (for liberty of conscience,) and "the separation of the Netherlands from the crown of Spain," felt that his energies were not yet exhausted on the subject; but his creative genius found no theatre of action such as was open to Lamartine in the French Chamber, in the purification of the ideas engendered by the Revolution; and he had therefore to content himself with bringing his poetical conceptions on the stage. Instead of becoming an actor in the great world-drama, he gave us his Wallenstein and Don Carlos; Lamartine gave us himself as the best creation of his poetic genius. The poet Lamartine has produced the statesman. This it will be necessary to bear in mind, to understand Lamartine's career in the Chamber of Deputies, or the position he now holds at the head of the provisional government.

Lamartine, as we have above observed, entered the French Chamber in 1833, as a cosmopolite, full of love for mankind, full of noble ideas of human destiny, and deeply impressed with the degraded social condition not only of his countrymen, but of all civilized Europe. He knew and felt that the Revolution which had destroyed the social elements of Europe, or thrown them in disorder, had not reconstructed and arranged them; and that the re-organization of society on the basis of humanity and mutual obligation, was still an unfinished problem. Lamartine felt this; but did the French Chambers, as they were then organized, offer him a fair scope for the development of his ideas, or the exercise of his genius? Certainly not. The French Chamber was divided into two great dynastic interests—those of the younger and elder Bourbons. The Republican party (the extreme left) was small, and without an acknowledged leader; and the whole assembly, with few individual exceptions, had taken a material direction. During seventeen years—from 1830 to 1847—no organic principle of law or politics was agitated in the Chambers, no new ideas evolved. The whole national legislation seemed to be directed toward material improvements, to the exclusion of every thing that could elevate the soul or inspire the masses with patriotic sentiments. The government of Louis Philippe had at first become stationary, then reactionary; the mere enunciation of a general idea inspired its members with terror, and made the centres (right and left) afraid of the horrors of the guillotine. The government of Louis Philippe was not a reign of terror, like that of 1793, but it was a reign of prospective terror, which it wished to avoid. Louis Philippe had no faith in the people; he treated them as the keeper of a menagerie would a tame tiger—he knew its strength, and he feared its vindictiveness. To disarm it, and to change its ferocious nature, he checked the progress of political ideas, instead of combating them with the weapons of reason, and banished from his counsel those who alone could have served as mediators between the throne and the liberties of the nation. The French people seemed stupified at the contre-coups to all their hopes and aspirations. Even the more moderate complained; but their complaints were hushed by the immediate prospect of an improved material condition. All France seemed to have become industrious, manufacturing, mercantile, speculating. The thirst for wealth had succeeded to the ambition of the Republicans, the fanaticism of the Jacobins, and the love of distinction of the old monarchists. The Chamber of Deputies no longer represented the French people—its love, its hatred, its devotion—the elasticity of its mind, its facility of emotion, its capacity to sacrifice itself for a great idea. The Deputies had become stock-jobbers, partners in large enterprises of internal improvements, and timidly conservative, as are always the representatives of mere property. The Chamber, instead of representing the essence of the nation, represented merely the moneyed classes of society.

Such was the Chamber of Deputies to which Lamartine was chosen by an electoral college, devoted to the Dynastic opposition. He entered it in 1833, not a technical politician or orator as Odillon Barrot, not as a skillful tactitioner like Thiers, not as a man with one idea as the Duke de Broglie, not as the funeral orator of departed grandeur like Berryer, nor as the embodiment of a legal abstraction like Dupin, or a man of the devouring ambition and skill in debate of François Pierre Guillaume Guizot: Lamartine was simply a humanitaire. Goaded by the sarcasm of Cormenin, he declared that he belonged to no party, that he sought for no parliamentary conquest—that he wished to triumph through the force of ideas, and through no power of persuasion. He was the very counterpart of Thiers, the most sterile orator and statesman of France. Lamartine had studied the French Revolution, he saw the anarchical condition of society, and the ineffectual attempt to compress instead of organizing it; and he con[28]ceived the noble idea of collecting the scattered fragments, and uniting them into a harmonious edifice. While the extreme left were employed in removing the pressure from above, Lamartine was quietly employed in laying the foundation of a new structure, and called himself un démocrate conservateur.[9] He spoke successfully and with great force against the political monopoly of real property, against the prohibitive system of trade, against slavery, and the punishment of death.[10] His speeches made him at once a popular character; he did not address himself to the Chamber, he spoke to the French people, in language that sunk deep into the hearts of the masses, without producing a striking effect in the Legislature. At that time already had the king singled him out from the rest of the opposition. He wished to secure his talents for his dynasty; but Lamartine was not in search of a portefeuille, and escaped without effort from the temptation.

In November, 1837, he was re-elected to the Chamber from Bergues and Mâcon, his native town. He decided in favor of the latter, and took his seat as a member for that place. He supported the Molé ministry, not because he had become converted to the new dynasty, but because he despised the Doctrinaires, who, by their union with the Liberals, brought in the new Soult ministry. He was not satisfied with the purity of motives, he also wanted proper means to attain a laudable object. In the Oriental question, which was agitated under Soult, Lamartine was not felt. His opposition was too vague and undefined: instead of pointing to the interests of France, he pointed to the duties of humanity of a great nation; he read Milton in a counting-room, and a commercial Maclaurin asked him "what does it prove?"

In 1841 his talent as an orator (he was never distinguished as a debater) was afforded ample scope by Thiers' project to fortify the capital. He opposed it vehemently, but without effect. In the boisterous session of 1842 he acted the part of a moderator; but still so far seconded the views of Thiers as to consider the left bank of the Rhine as the proper and legitimate boundary of France against Germany. This debate, it is well known, produced a perfect storm of popular passions in Germany. In a few weeks the whole shores of the Rhine were bristling with bayonets; the peasantry in the Black Forest began to clean and polish their rusty muskets, buried since the fall of Napoleon, and the princes perceiving that the spirit of nationality was stronger than that of freedom, encouraged this popular declaration against French usurpation. Nicolas Becker, a modest German, without pretension or poetic genius, but inspired by an honest love of country and national glory, then composed a war-song, commencing thus:

which was soon in every man's mouth, and being set to music, became for a short period the German Marseillaise. Lamartine answered the German with the Marseillaise de paix, (the Marseillaise of peace,) which produced a deep impression; and the fall of the Thiers' ministry soon calmed the warlike spirit throughout Europe.

On the question of the Regency, Lamartine declared himself in favor of the Duchess of Orleans as Regent, should Louis Philippe die during the minority of the Count of Paris, and it is our firm belief that he would have accepted that Regency even in February last, if the king had abdicated a day sooner. Lamartine never avowed himself a Republican; but was left no alternative but to eclipse himself forever, or become its champion.

The star of Lamartine's political destiny rose in the session of 1843, when, utterly disgusted with the reactionary policy of Guizot, he conceived the practical idea of uniting all the elements of opposition, of whatever shade and color, against the government. But he was not satisfied with this movement in the Chamber, which produced the coalition of the Dynastic right with the Democratic left, and for a moment completely paralyzed the administration of Guizot: he carried his new doctrine right before the people, as the legitimate source of the Chamber, and thus became the first political agitator of France since the restoration, in the legitimate, legal, English sense of the word. Finding that the press was muzzled, or subsidized and bought, he moved his countrymen through the power of his eloquence. He appealed from the Chamber to the sense and the virtue of the people. In September, 1843, he first addressed the electors of Mâcon on the necessity of extending the franchise, in order to admit of a greater representation of the French people—generous, magnanimous, bold and devoted to their country. Instead of fruitlessly endeavoring to reform the government, he saw that the time had come for reforming the Chamber.

In the month of October, of the same year—so rapidly did his new political genius develop itself—he published a regular programme for the opposition; a thing which Thiers, up to that moment, had studiously avoided, not to break entirely with the king, and to render himself still "possible" as a minister of the crown. Lamartine knew no such selfish consideration, which has destroyed Thiers as a man of the people, and declared himself entirely independent of the throne of July. He advocated openly the abolition of industrial feudalism, and the foundation of a new democratic society under a constitutional throne.

Thus, then, had Lamartine separated himself not only from the king and his ministers, but also from the ancient noblesse and the bourgeoisie, without approaching or identifying himself with the Republican left wing of the Chamber. He stood alone, admired for his genius, his irreproachable rectitude, his devoted patriotism, but considered rather as a poetical abstraction, an impracticable Utopist; and yet he was the only man in the Chamber who had[29] devised a practical means of regenerating the people and the government. Lamartine was now considered a parliamentary oddity rather than the leader of a faction, or the representative of a political principle; but he was indeed far in advance of the miserable routine of his colleagues. He personated, indeed, no principle represented in the Chamber, but he was already the Tribune of the unrepresented masses! The people had declared the government a fraud—the Chamber an embodied falsehood. At last Marrast, one of the editors of the National, (now a member of the provisional government,) pronounced it in his paper that the French people had no representation, that it was in vain to attempt to oppose the government in the legislature: "La Chambre," said Marrast, "n'est qu' un mensonge."[11]

Lamartine had thus, all at once, as if by a coup-de-main, become "a popular greatness." He was the man of the people, without having courted popularity—that stimulus (as he himself called it) to so many noble acts and crimes, as the object of its caresses remains its conscious master or its pandering slave. Lamartine grew rapidly in public estimation, because he was a new man. All the great characters of the Chamber, beginning with Casimir Perrier, had, in contact with Louis Philippe, become either eclipsed or tarnished. Lamartine avoided the court, but openly and frankly confessed that he belonged to no party. He had boldly avowed his determination to oppose the government of Louis Philippe, not merely this or that particular direction, which it took in regard to its internal and external relations; but in its whole general tendency. He was neither the friend nor the enemy of a particular combination for the ministry, and had, during a short period, given his support to Count Molé, not because he was satisfied with his administration, but because he thought the opposition and its objects less virtuous than the minister. In this independent position, supported by an ample private fortune, (inherited, as we before observed, by his maternal uncle, and the returns of his literary activity,) Lamartine became an important element of parliamentary combination, from the weight of his personal influence, while at the same time his "utopies," as they were termed by the tactitioners of Alphonse Thiers, gave but little umbrage to the ambition of his rivals. He alone enjoyed some credit with the masses, though his social position ranked with the first in the country, while, from the peculiar bend of his mind, and the idealization of his principles, he was deemed the most harmless aspirant to political power. The practical genius of the opposition, everlastingly occupied with unintellectual details of a venal class-legislature, saw in Lamartine a useful co-operator: they never dreamt that the day would come when they would be obliged to serve under him.

And, in truth, it must be admitted that without the Revolution of February, Lamartine must have been condemned to a comparative political inactivity. With the exception of a few friends, personally devoted to him, he had no party in the Chamber. The career which he had entered, as the people's Tribune, placed him, in a measure, in opposition to all existing parties; but it was even this singular position of parliamentary impotence, which confirmed and strengthened his reputation as an honest man, in contradistinction to a notoriously corrupt legislature. His eloquence in the Chamber had no particular direction; but it was the sword of justice, and was, as such, dreaded by all parties. As a statesman his views were tempered by humanity, and so little specific as to be almost anti-national. In his views as regards the foreign policy of France he was alike opposed to Guizot and Thiers; and, perhaps, to a large portion of the French people. He wished the external policy of France governed by a general principle, as the internal politics of the country, and admitted openly the solidarity of interests of the different states of Europe. He thus created for himself allies in Germany, in Italy, in Spain; but he lacked powerful supporters at home; and became the most impracticable man to carry out the aggressive views of the fallen Dynasty. Thiers never considered him a rival; for he considered him incapable of ever becoming the exponent of a leading popular passion: neither the present nor the future seemed to present a chance for Lamartine's accession to power. L'homme positive, as Thiers was pleased to call himself at the tribune of the Chamber, almost commiserated the poet statesman and orator.

Lamartine never affected, in his manner or in his mode of living, that "republican simplicity" which is so often nothing but the frontispiece of demagoguism. He despised to flatter the people, for whom he cherished a generous sentiment, by vulgar appeal to their ignoble prejudices. He gratified his tastes where they did not come in conflict with morality or justice, and thus preserved his individuality and his friends, in the midst of the swelling tide of popular commotion and conflicting opinions. Guizot affected in his déhors that severity and simplicity of style, which won for him the soubriquet of "the Puritan;" bestowed by the sarcasm of the Parisians, to punish his egotism, his craving ambition and his love of power. While Guizot was penetrating the mysteries of European diplomacy, under the guidance of Princess Lieven, Lamartine's hôtel, in the Rue de l'Université was the réunion of science, literature, wit, elegance and grace. His country-seat near Paris was as elegantly furnished and artistically arranged as his palace in the Faubourg St. Germain; and his weekly receptions in Paris were as brilliant as they were attractive by the intelligence of those who had the honor to frequent them. The élite of the old nobility, the descendants of the notabilities of the Empire, the historical remnants of the Gironde and the Jacobins, the versatility of French genius in every department, and distinguished strangers from all parts of the world were his guests; excluded were only the men of mere accidental position—the mob in politics, literature and the arts.

But the time for Lamartine had not yet come, though the demoralization of the government, and the[30] sordid impulses given by it to the national legislature were fast preparing that anarchy of passions which no government has the power to render uniform, though it may compress it. The ministry in the session of 1845 was defeated by the coalition; but the defection of Emil de Girardin saved it once more from destruction. Meanwhile Duchâtel, the Minister of the Interior, had found means, by a gigantic system of internal improvement, (by a large number of concessions for new rail-ways and canals,) to obtain from the same Chamber a ministerial majority, which toward the close of the session amounted to nearly eighty members. Under such auspices the new elections were ushered in, and the result was an overwhelming majority for the administration. The government was not to be shaken in the Chambers, but its popular ascendancy had sunk to zero. The opposition from being parliamentary had become organic. The opposition, seeing all hopes of success vanish in the Chambers, now embraced Lamartine's plan of agitating the people. They must either fall into perfect insignificance or dare to attack the very basis of the government. The party of Thiers and Odillon Barrot joined the movement, and by that means gave it a practical direction; while Lamartine, Marrast, Louis Blanc, and Ledru Rollin were operating on the masses, Thiers and Odillon Barrot indoctrinated the National Guards. While Thiers was willing to stake his life to dethrone Guizot, the confederates of Lamartine aimed at an organic change of the constitution.

Was Lamartine a conspirator? may here be asked. We answer most readily, no! Lamartine is what himself says of Robespierre, "a man of general ideas;" but not a man of a positive system; and hence, incapable of devising a plan for attaining a specific political object. His opposition to Louis Philippe's government was general; but it rested on a noble basis, and was free from individual passions. He may have been willing to batter it, but he did not intend its demolition. The Republic of France was proclaimed in the streets, partly as the consequence of the king's cowardice. Lamartine accepted its first office, because he had to choose between it and anarchy, and he has thus far nobly discharged his trust. If he is not a statesman of consummate ability, who would devise means of extricating his country from a difficult and perilous situation, he will not easily plunge it into danger; if he be not versed in the intrigues of cabinets, his straight forward course commands their respect, and the confidence of the French people. This is not the time for Europe to give birth to new ideas—the old Revolution has done that sufficiently—but the period has arrived for elaborating them, with a view to a new and lasting organization of society. The present revolution in Europe need not forcibly overthrow any established political creed; for there is no established political conviction in Europe. The people have arrived at a period of universal political scepticism, which, like scepticism in religion, always prepares the soil for the reception of the seed of a new faith. The great work of the revolution is done, if the people will but seize and perpetuate its consequences. Such, at least, are the views of Lamartine, and with him of a majority of European writers, as expressed in the literature of the day.

The history of the Girondists contains Lamartine's political faith. It is not without its poetry and its Utopian visions; but it is full of thought and valuable reflections, and breathes throughout the loftiest and most noble sentiments. Lamartine, in that history, becomes the panegyrist and the censor of the French Revolution. He vindicates with a powerful hand the ideas which it evolved; while he castigates, and depicts with poetic melancholy its mournful errors and its tragic character. He makes Vergniaud, the chief of the Girondists, say before his execution—"In grafting the tree, my friend, we have killed it. It was too old. Robespierrie cuts it. Will he be more successful than ourselves? No. This soil is too unsteady to nourish the roots of civil liberty; this people is too childish to handle its laws without wounding itself. It will come back to its kings as children come back to their rattle. We made a mistake in our births, in being born and dying for the liberty of the world. We imagined that we were in Rome, and we were in Paris. But revolutions are like those crises which, in a single night, turn men's hair gray. They ripen the people fast. The blood in our veins is warm enough to fecundate the soil of the Republic. Let us not take with us the future, and let us bequeath to the people our hope in return for the death which it gives us."[12]

It is impossible that Lamartine should not have felt as a poet what he expressed as a historian, and his character is too sincere to prevent him from acting out his conviction. In describing the death of the founders of the first French Republic, Lamartine employs the whole pathos of his poetic inspiration.

"They (the Girondists) possessed three virtues which in the eyes of posterity atone for many faults. They worshiped liberty; they founded the Republic—this precautions truth of future governments;—at last, they died, because they refused blood to the people. Their time has condemned them to death, the future has judged them to glory and pardon. They died because they did not allow Liberty to soil itself, and posterity will yet engrave on their memory the inscription which Vergniaud, their oracle, has, with his own hand, engraved on the wall of his dungeon: 'Rather death than crime!' 'Potius mori quam foedari!'"

Lamartine is visibly inclined in favor of the Girondists—the founders of the Republic; but his sense of justice does not permit him to condemn the Jacobins without vindicating their memory from that crushing judgment which their contemporaries pronounced upon them. He thus describes, in a few masterly strokes, the character of Robespierre:

"Robespierre's refusal of the supreme power was [31]sincere in the motives which he alleged. But there were other motives which caused him to reject the sole government. These motives he did not yet avow. The fact is that he had arrived at the end of his thoughts, and that himself did not know what form was best suited to revolutionary institutions. More a man of ideas than of action, Robespierre had the sentiment of the Revolution rather than the political formula. The soul of the institutions of the future was in his dreams, but he lacked the mechanism of a popular government. His theories, all taken from books, were brilliant and vague as perspectives, and cloudy as the far distance. He contemplated them daily; he was dazzled by them; but he never touched them with the firm and precise hand of practice. He forgot that Liberty herself requires the protection of a strong power, and that this power must have a head to conceive, and hands to execute. He believed that the words Liberty, Equality, Disinterestedness, Devotion, Virtue, incessantly repeated, were themselves a government. He took philosophy for politics, and became indignant at his false calculations. He attributed continually his deceptions to the conspiracies of aristocrats and demagogues. He thought that in extinguishing from society the aristocrats and demagogues, he would be able to suppress the vices of humanity, and the obstacles to the work of liberal institutions. His notion of the people was an illusion, not a reality. He became irritated to find the people often so weak, so cowardly, so cruel, so ignorant, so changeable, so unworthy the rank which nature has assigned them. He became irritated and soured, and challenged the scaffold to extricate him from his difficulties. Then, indignant at the excesses of the scaffold, he returned to words of justice and humanity. Then once more he seized upon the scaffold, invoked virtue and suscitated death. Floating sometimes on clouds, sometimes in human gore, he despaired of mankind and became frightened at himself. 'Death, and nothing but death!' he cried, in conversation with his intimate friends, 'and the villains charge it upon me. What memory shall I leave behind me if this goes on? Life is a burthen to me!'"

Once, says Lamartine, the truth became manifest. He (Robespierre) exclaimed, with a gesture of despair, "No, I was not made to govern, I was made to combat the enemies of the people!"

These meditations on the character of Robespierre, show sufficiently that Lamartine, though he may not as yet have taken a positive direction in politics, has at least, from his vague poetical conceptions, returned to a sound state of political criticism, the inevitable precursor of sound theories. His views on the execution of the royal family are severe but just.

"Had the French nation a right to judge Louis XVI. as a legal tribunal?" demands Lamartine. "No! Because the judge ought to be impartial and disinterested—and the nation was neither the one nor the other. In this terrible but inevitable combat, in which, under the name of revolution, royalty and liberty were engaged for emancipating or enslaving the citizen, Louis XVI. personified the throne, the nation personified liberty. This was not their fault, it was their nature. All attempts at a mutual understanding were in vain. Their natures warred against each other in spite of their inclination toward peace. Between these two adversaries, the king and the people, of whom the one, by instinct, was prompted to retain, the other to wrest from its antagonist the rights of the nation, there was no tribunal but combat, no judge but victory. We do not mean to say that there was not above the parties a moral of the case, and acts which judge even victory itself. This justice never perishes in the eclipse of the law, and the ruin of empires; but it has no tribunal before which it can legally summon the accused; it is the justice of state, the justice which has neither regularly appointed judges, nor written laws, but which pronounces its sentences in men's consciences, and whose code is equity."

"Louis XVI. could not be judged in politics or equity, but by a process of state. Had the nation a right to judge him thus? As well might we demand whether she had a right to fight and conquer, in other words, as well might we ask whether despotism is inviolable—whether liberty is a revolt—whether there is no justice here below but for kings—whether there is, for the people, no other right than to serve and obey? The mere doubt is an act of impiety toward the people."

So far the political philosophy of Lamartine, the legal argument against the king, strikes us as less logical and just. We may agree with him in principle, but we cannot assent to the abstract justice of his conclusions.

"The nation," says the head of the present provisional government of France, "possessing within itself the inalienable sovereignty which rests in reason, in the right and the will of each citizen, the aggregate of which constitutes the people, possesses certainly the faculty of modifying the exterior form of its sovereignty, to level its aristocracy, to dispossess its church of its property, to lower or even to suppress the throne, and to govern themselves through their proper magistrates. But as the nation had a right to combat and emancipate itself, she also had a right to watch over and consolidate the fruits of its victories. If, then, Louis XVI., a king too recently dispossessed of sovereign power—a king in whose eyes all restitution of power to the people was tantamount to a forfeiture—a king ill satisfied with what little of government remained in his hands, aspiring to reconquer the part he had lost—torn in one direction by a usurping assembly, and in another by a restless queen or humble nobility, and a clergy which made Heaven to intervene in his cause, by implacable emigrants, by his brothers running all over Europe to drum up enemies to the Revolution; if, in one word, Louis XVI., KING, appeared to the nation a living conspiracy against her liberty; if the nation suspected him of regretting in his soul too much the loss of supreme power—of causing the new constitution to stumble, in order to profit by its fall—of conducting liberty into snares to rejoice in anarchy—of disarming the country be[32]cause he secretly wished it to be defeated—then the nation had a right to make him descend from the throne, and to call him to her bar, and to depose him in the name of her own dictatorship, and for her own safety. If the nation had not possessed this right, the right to betray the people with impunity, would, in the new constitution, have been one of the prerogatives of the crown."

This is a pretty fair specimen of revolutionary reasoning; but it is rather a definition of Democracy, as Lamartine understands it, than a constitutional argument in favor of the decapitation of "Louis Capet." Lamartine is, indeed, a "Conservative Democrat," that is, ready to immolate the king to preserve the rights of the people; but he does not distinguish in his mind a justifiable act from a righteous one. But it is a peculiarity of the French mind to identify itself so completely with the object of its reflection, that it is impossible for a French mind to be impartial, or as they will have it, not to be an enthusiast. The French are partisans even in science; the Academy itself has its factions.

We have thus quoted the most important political opinions expressed in his "Girondists," because these are his latest political convictions, and he has subscribed to them his name. We look upon this his last work, as a public confession of his faith—as a declaration of the principles which will guide him in the administration of the new government. Lamartine has been indoctrinated with the spirit of revolution; but it is not the spirit of his youth or early manhood. Liberty in his hands becomes something poetical—perhaps a lyric poem—but we respectfully doubt his capacity to give her a practical organization, and a real existence. High moral precepts and sublime theories may momentarily elevate a people to the height of a noble devotion; but laws and institutions are made for ordinary men, and must be adapted to their circumstances. Herein consists the specific talent of the statesman, and his capacity to govern. Government is not an ideal abstraction—a blessing showered from a given height on the abiding masses, or a scourge applied to mortify their passions; it is something natural and spontaneous, originating in and coeval with the people, and must be adapted to their situation, their moral and intellectual progress, and to their national peculiarities. It consists of details as well as of general forms, and requires labor and industry as well as genius. The majority of the people must not only yield the laws a ready submission, but they must find, or at least believe, it their interest to do so, or the government becomes coercion. The great problem of Europe is to discover the laws of labor, not to invent them, for without this question being practically settled in some feasible manner, all fine spun theories will not suffice to preserve the government.

Lamartine closes his history of the Girondists with the following sublime though mystic reflection: "A nation ought, no doubt, to weep her dead, and not to console itself in regard to a single life that has been unjustly and odiously sacrificed; but it ought not to regret its blood when it was shed to reveal eternal truths. God has put this price on the germination and maturation of all His designs in regard to man. Ideas vegetate in human blood; revolutions descend from the scaffold. All religions become divine through martyrdom. Let us, then, pardon each other, sons of combatants and victims. Let us become reconciled over their graves to take up the work which they have left undone. Crime has lost every thing in introducing itself into the ranks of the republic. To do battle is not to immolate. Let us take away the crime from the cause of the people, as a weapon which has pierced their hands and changed liberty into despotism. Let us not seek to justify the scaffold with the cause of our country, and proscriptions by the cause of liberty. Let us not pardon the spirit of our age by the sophism of revolutionary energy, let humanity preserve its heart; it is the safest and most infallible of its principles, and let us resign ourselves to the condition of human things. The history of the Revolution is glorious and sad as the day after the victory, or the eve of another combat. But if this history is full of mourning, it is also full of faith. It resembles the antique drama where, while the narrator recites his story, the chorus of the people shouts the glory, weeps for the victims and raises a hymn of consolation and hope to God."

All this is very beautiful, but it does not increase our stock of historical information. It teaches the people resignation, instead of pointing to their errors, and the errors of those who claimed to be their deliverers. Lamartme has made an apotheosis of the Revolution, instead of treating it as the unavoidable consequence of misgovernment. To an English or American reader the allusion to "the blood sacrifice," which is necessary in politics as in religion, would border on impiety; with the French it is probably a proof of religious faith. Lamartine, in his views and conceptions, in his mode of thinking and philosophizing, is much more nearly allied to the German than to the English schools; only that, instead of a philosophical system, carried through with a rigorous and unsparing logic, he indulges in philosophical reveries. As a statesman Lamartine lacks speciality, and for this reason we think that his administration will be a short one.

[33]

With respect to character, energy, and courage, Lamartine has few equals. He has not risen to power by those crafty combinations which destroy a man's moral greatness in giving him distinction. "Greatness" was, indeed, "thrust upon him," and thus far he has nobly and courageously sustained it. He neither courted power, nor declined it. When it was offered, he did not shrink from assuming the responsibility of accepting it. He has no vulgar ambition to gratify, no insults to revenge, no devotion to reward. He stands untrammeled and uncommitted to any faction whatever. He may not be able to solve the social problem of the age; but will, in that case, surrender his command untarnished as he received it, and serve once more in the ranks.

Every body has had an Aunt Peggy—an Aunt Patty—an Aunt Penelope, or an aunt something else; but every body hasn't had an Aunt Polly—i. e. such an Aunt Polly as mine! Most Aunt Pollies have been the exemplars and promulgators of "single blessedness"—not such was she! But more of this anon. Aunt Polly was the only sister of my father, who often spoke of her affectionately; but would end his remark with "poor Polly! so nervous—so unlike her self-possessed and beautiful mother"—whose memory he devoutly revered. Children are not destitute of the curiosity native to the human mind, and we often teased papa about a visit from Aunt Polly, who, he replied, never left home; but not enlightening us on the why, his replies only served to whet the edge of curiosity more and more. I never shall forget the surprise that opened my eye-lids early and wide one morning, when it was announced to me that Aunt Polly and her spouse had unexpectedly arrived at the homestead. It would be difficult to analyze the nature of that eagerness which hastily dressed and sent me down stairs. But unfortunately did I enter the breakfast-room just as the good book was closing, and the family circle preparing to finish its devotions on the knee; however, a glance of the eye takes but little time, and a penetrating look was returned me by Aunt Polly, in which the beaming affection of her sanguine nature, and the scowl of scarce restrained impatience to get hold of me, were mixed so strangely as to give her naturally sharp black eyes an expression almost fearful to a child; but on surveying her unique apparel, and indescribably uneasy position on the chair—for she remained seated while the rest of us knelt, giving me thus an opportunity to scrutinize her through the interstices of my chair-back—so excited my girlish risibilities, that fear became stifled in suppressed laughter. "Amen" was scarce pronounced, when a shrill voice called out—"Come here, you little good-for-nothing—what's your name?" The inviting smile conveyed to me with these startling tones left no doubt who was addressed, and I instantly obeyed the really fervent call. Both the stout arms of my aunt were opened to receive me, but held me at their length, while—with a nervous sensibility that made the tears gush from her eyes—she hurriedly exclaimed—"What shall I do with you? Do you love to be squeezed? When, suiting the action to the question, she embraced me with a tenacity that almost choked my breath. From that moment I loved Aunt Polly! The fervid outpouring of her affection had mingled with the well-springs of a heart that—despite its mischievousness—was ever brimming with love. The first gush of feeling over, Aunt Polly again held me at arm's distance, while she surveyed intently my features, and traced in the laughing eye and golden ringlets the likeness of her "dearest brother in the world!" Poor aunty had but one! Nor was my opportunity lost of looking right into the face I had so often desired to see. It would be hard to draw a picture of Aunt Polly in words, so good as the reader's fancy will supply. There was nothing peculiar in her tall, stout figure; in her well developed features—something between the Grecian and the Roman—in her complexion, which one could see had faded from a glowing brunette to a pale Scotch snuff color. But her eyes, they were peculiar—so black—so rapid in their motions—so penetrating when looking forward—so flashing when she laughed, that really—I never saw such eyes!

It would be still more puzzling to describe her dress. She wore a real chintz of the olden time, filled with nosegays, as unlike to Nature's flowers as the fashion of her gown was to the dresses of modern dames of her sixty years. Though I don't believe Aunt Polly's attire looked like any body else's at the time it was made; at any rate, it was put on in a way that differed from the pictures I had seen of the old-school ladies. Her cap was indeed the crowner! but let that pass, for the old lady had these dainty articles so carefully packed in what had been a sugar-box, that no doubt they were sweet to any taste but mine. I said that Aunt Polly was not a spinster. A better idea of her lord cannot be given than in her own words to my eldest sister, who declared in her hearing that she would never marry a minister. "Hush, hush, my dear!" said Aunt Polly, "I remember saying, when I was a girl, that whatever faults my husband might have, he should never be younger than myself—have red hair, or stammer in his speech: all these objections were united in the man I married!"

One more fact will convey to the imagination all that I need say of Aunt Polly's husband. Late one evening came a thundering knock at my father's door, and as all the servants had retired, a youth who happened to be staying with us at the time, started, candle in hand, to answer it: Now the young man was of a credulous turn, and had just awakened from a snooze in his chair. Presently a loud shriek called all who were up in the house to the door, where, lying prostrate and faint, was found the youth, and standing over him, with eye-balls distended—making ineffectual efforts to speak—was the husband of Aunt Polly. When the lad recovered, all that he could tell of his mishap was, that on opening the street-door a man, wrapped in a large over-coat, with glassy eyes staring straight at him, opened and shut his mouth four times without utter[35]ing a syllable—when the candle fell from his hands, and he to the floor! Aunt Polly's spouse was the prince of stammerers! But if he could seldom begin a sentence, so Aunt Polly could seldom finish one: indeed the most noticeable point in her conversation was, that it had no point, or was made up of sentences broken off in the middle. This may have been physiologically owing to the velocity with which the nervous fluid passed through her brain, giving uncommon rapidity to her thoughts, and correspondingly to the motions of her body. It soon became a wonder to my girlish mind how Aunt Polly ever kept still long enough to listen to a declaration of love—especially from a stutterer—or even to respond to the marriage ceremony.

My wonder now is, how the functions of her system ever had time to fulfill their offices, or the flesh to accumulate, as it did, to a very respectable consistency; for she never, to my knowledge, finished a meal while under our roof; nor do I believe that she ever slept out a nap in her life. As she became a study well fitted to interest one of my novel, fun-loving age, I used often to steal out of bed at different times in the night and peep from my own apartment into hers, which adjoined it, where a night lamp was always burning; for she insisted on having the door between left open. I invariably found those eyes of hers wide awake, and my own room being dark, took pleasure in watching her unobserved, as she fidgeted now with her ample-bordered night-cap, and now with the bed-clothes. Once was I caught by a sudden cough on my part, which brought Aunt Polly to her feet before I had time to slip back to bed; and the only plea that my guiltiness could make her kind remonstrance on my being up in the cold, was the very natural and very wicked fib, that I heard her move and thought she might want something. Unsuspecting old lady! May her ashes at least rest in peace! How she caught me in her arms, kissed and carried me to bed, tucking in the blankets so effectually that all attempts to get up again that night were vain! Oh, she was a love of an aunt! The partiality of her attachment to me might have been accounted for by her having had no children of her own; or to the evident interest which she excited in me, causing my steps to follow her wherever she went; though all the family endeavored to make her first and last visit as agreeable as possible. But every attempt to fasten her attention to an object of interest or curiosity long enough to understand it, was unavailing. Sometimes I sallied out with her into the street, and while rather pleased than mortified by the observation which her grotesque costume and nervous, irregular gait attracted, it was different with me when she attempted to shop; as more often than otherwise, she would begin to pay for articles purchased, and putting her purse abruptly in her pocket, hurry toward the door, as if on purpose to avoid a touch on the elbow, which sometimes served to jog her memory also, and sometimes the very purchases were forgotten, till I became their witness.

On the whole, Aunt Polly's visit was a source of more amusement to me than all the visits of all my school-mates put together. When we parted—for I truly loved her—I forgave the squeeze—a screw-turn tighter than that at our meeting—and promised through my tears to make her a visit whenever my parents would consent to it. The homestead was as still for a week after her departure, as a ball-room after the waltzers have all whirled themselves home. Hardly had the family clock-work commenced its methodical revolutions again, when a letter arrived; and who that knew Aunt Polly, could have mistaken its characteristic superscription.

My father was well-known at the post office, or the half-written-out-name would never have found its way into his box. Internally, the letter was made up of broken sentences, big with love, like the large, fragmentary drops of rain from a passing summer cloud. By dint of patient perseverance we "gathered up the fragments, so that nothing was lost" of Aunt Polly's itinerant thoughts or wishes.

Among the latter was an invitation for me to visit her, on which my father looked silently and negatively; but I was not thus to be denied a desire of the heart, and insisted on having an audible response to my request of permission to fulfill the parting promise to Aunt Polly. In vain did my father give first an evasive answer, and then hint at the disappointment likely to await such a step—recall to my mind the eccentricities of his "worthy sister"—endeavor by all gentle means of persuasion to deter me from my purpose, and finally try to frighten me out of it. I was incorrigible.

Not long after, a gentleman who resided in the town with my aunt, came to visit us, and being alone in a comfortable one-horse vehicle, was glad enough to accept my offered company on his way home; so, gaining the reluctant consent of my mother, I started, full of an indefinite sort of pleasurable expectation, nourished by the changing diorama of a summer afternoon's ride through a cultivated part of the country.

Arriving at the verge of a limpid stream, my companion turned the horse to drink, so suddenly, that the wheels became cramped, and we were precipitated into the water, the wagon turning a summerset directly over our heads. Strange to say, neither of us were hurt, and the stream was shallow, though deep enough to give us a thorough cold bath, and to deluge the trunk containing my clothes, the lock of which flew open in the fall. My mortified protector crept from under our capsized ark as soon as he could, and let me out at the window; when I felt myself to be in rather a worse condition than was Noah's dove, who "found no rest for the sole of her foot;" for beside dripping from all my garments, like a surcharged umbrella, my soul, too, found no foothold of excuse on which to stand justified before my father for exposing myself to such an emergence without his knowledge. However, return we must. Nor was the situation of my conductor's body or mind very enviable, being obliged to present me to my parents, drooping like a water-lily. But if ill-luck had pursued us, good luck awaited our return; for we found that my father had[36] not yet arrived from his business, and my mother's conscience kept our secret; so that frustration in my first attempt to visit Aunt Polly, was all the evil that came out of the adventure. Notwithstanding my ardor had been so damped with cold water, it was yet warm enough for another effort; though it must be confessed, that for a few days subsequent to the accident, my animal spirits were something in the state of over-night—uncorked champagne.

The first sign of their renewed vitality was the again expressed desire to visit Aunt Polly. I, however, learned obedience by the things I had suffered, and resolved not to venture on another expedition without the approval and protection of my father, who, because of my importunity, at length consented to accompany me, provided I would not reveal to Aunt Polly the proposed length of my visit until I had spent a day and night under her roof. This I readily consented to, thinking only at the time what a strange proviso it was. Accordingly, arrangements were soon completed for the long coveted journey; but not until I had remonstrated with my mother on her limited provision for my wardrobe, furnishing me only with what a small carpet-bag would contain.

After a ride of some forty miles, through scenery that gave fresh inspiration to my hopes, we arrived at the witching hour of sunset, before a venerable-looking farm-house. Its exterior gave no signs in the form of shrubbery or flowers of the decorating, refining hand of woman; but the sturdy oak and sycamore were there to give shade, and the life-scenes that surrounded the farm-yard were plenty in promise of eggs and poultry for the keen appetites of the travelers.

As we drove into the avenue leading to a side-door of the mansion, I caught a glimpse of Aunt Polly's unparalleled cap through a window, and the next moment she stood on the steps, wringing her hands and crying for joy. An involuntary dread of another squeezing came over me, which had scarce time to be idealized ere it was realized almost to suffocation. My father's more graduated look of pleasure, called from Aunt Polly an out-bursting—"Forgive me, forgive me! It's my only brother in the world! It's my dear little puss all over again! Forgive me, forgive me!" But during these ejaculations I was confirmed in a discovery that had escaped all my vigilance while Aunt Polly sojourned with us. She was a snuff-taker! That she took snuff, as she did every thing else, by snatches, I had also ascertained, on seeing her in the door, when she thought herself yet beyond the reach of our vision, forgetting that young eyes can see further than old eyes; mine could not be deceived in the convulsive motion that carried her fore-finger and thumb to the tip of her olfactory organ, which drew up one snuff of the fragrant weed—as hurriedly as a porpoise puts his head out of water for a snuff of the sweet air of morning—when scattering the rest of the pinch to the four winds, she forgot, in her excitement, for once, to wipe the traces from her upper lip. Had I only suspected before, the hearty sneeze on my part that followed close upon her kiss, would have made that suspicion a certainty. Aunt Polly was, indeed, that inborn abhorrence of mine, a snuff-taker! Thus my rosy prospects began to assume a yellowish tinge before entering the house; what color they took afterward it would be difficult to tell; for the wild confusion of its interior, gave to my fancy as many and as mixed hues as one sees in a kaleidoscope.

The old-fashioned parlor had a corner cupboard, which appeared to be put to any use but the right one, while the teacups and saucers—no whole set alike—were indiscriminately arranged on the side-board, and in it I saw, as the door stood ajar, Aunt Polly's bonnet and shawl; a drawer, too, being half open, disclosed one of her sweetish caps, side by side with a card of gingerbread. The carpet was woven of every color, in every form, but without any definite figure, and promised to be another puzzle for my curious eyes to unravel; it seemed to have been just thrown down with here and there a tack in it, only serving to make it look more awry. While amusing myself with this carpet, it recalled an incident that a roguish cousin of mine once related to me after he had been to see Aunt Polly, connected with this parlor, which she always called her "square-room!" One day during his visit the old lady having occasion to step into a neighbor's house, while a pot of lard was trying over the kitchen fire, and not being willing to trust her half-trained servants to watch it, she gave the precious oil in charge to this youth, who was one of her favorites, bidding him, after a stated time, remove it from the chimney to a cooling-place; now not finishing her directions, the lad indulged his mischievous propensities by attempting to place the kettle of boiling lard to cool in the square-room fire-place; but finding it heavier than his strength could carry, its contents were suddenly deposited on the carpet, save such sprinklings as served to brand his face and hands as the culprit of the mischief.

The terrified boy hearing Aunt Polly's step on the threshold, took the first way that was suggested to him of escaping her wrath, which led out at the window. Scarce had his agile limbs landed him safe on terra firma, when the door opened, and, preceded by a shriek that penetrated his hiding-place, he heard Aunt Polly's lamentable lamentation—"It's my square-room! my square-room carpet! Oh! that I should live to see it come to this!" and again, and again, were these heart-thrilling exclamations reiterated. The lad, finding that all the good lady's excitement was likely to be spent on the square-room—though, alas! all wouldn't exterminate the grease—recovered courage and magnanimity enough to reveal himself as the author of the catastrophe, which he did with such contrition, showing at the same time his wounds, that Aunt Polly soon began "to take on" about her dear boy, to the seeming forgetfulness, while anointing his burns, of the kettle of lard and her unfortunate square-room.

But I must take up again the broken thread of my own adventures in this square-room, where I[37] left Aunt Polly flourishing about in joy at our unexpected arrival.

A large, straight-backed rocking-chair stood in one corner of this apartment, and on its cushion—stuffed with feathers, and covered with blazing chintz—lay a large gray cat curled up asleep—decidedly the most comfortable looking object in the room—till Aunt Polly unceremoniously shook her out of her snug quarters to give my father the chair. I then discovered that poor puss was without a tail! On expressing my surprise, aunt only replied—"Oh, my cats are all so!" And, true enough, before we left, I saw some half dozen round the house, all deficient in this same graceful appendage of the feline race. The human domestics of the family were only half-grown—but half did their work, and seemed altogether naturalized to the whirligig spirit of their mistress. The reader may anticipate the consequences to the culinary and table arrangements. For supper we had, not unleavened bread, but that which contained "the little leaven," that having had no time to "leaven the whole lump," rendered it still heavier of digestion; butter half-worked, tea made of water that did not get time to boil, and slack-baked cakes. I supped on cucumbers, and complaining of fatigue, was conducted by my kind aunt to the sleeping apartment next her own, as it would seem like old times to have me so near. What was wanting to make my bed comfortable, might have been owing to the fact, that the feathers under me had been only half-baked, or were picked from geese of Aunt Polly's raising; at any rate, I was as restless as the good lady herself until daylight, when I fell into as uneasy dreams—blessing the ducking that saved me a more lingering fate before. After a brief morning-nap I arose, and seeing fresh eggs brought in from the farm-yard, confidently expected to have my appetite appeased, knowing that they could be cooked in "less than no time;" but here again disappointment awaited me. For once, Aunt Polly's mis-hit was in over-doing. The coffee sustained in part her reputation, being half-roasted, half-ground, half-boiled, and, I may add, half-swallowed. After this breakfast—or keepfast—my father archly inquired of me aside, how long I wished him to leave me with Aunt Polly, as he must return immediately home. Horror at the idea of being left at all overcame the mortification that my reaction of feeling naturally occasioned, and throwing my arms around his neck, I implored him to take me back with him. This reply he took as coolly as if he were prepared for it. Not so did Aunt Polly receive the announcement of my departure. She insisted that I had promised her a visit, and this was no visit at all. My father humored her fondness with his usual tact; but on telling her that it was really necessary for me to return to school, the kind woman relinquished at once her selfish claims, in view of a greater good to me.

Poor Aunt Polly! if my affection for her was less disinterested than her own, it was none the less in quantity; and I never loved her more than when she gave me that cruelest of squeezes at our parting, which proved to be the last—for I never saw her again. But in proof that she loved me to the end, I was remembered in her will; and did I not believe that if living, her generous affection, that was the precious oil through which floated her eccentricities like "flies as big as bumble-bees," would smooth over all appearance of ridicule in these reminiscences, they should never amuse any one save myself. But really, I cannot better carry out her restless desire of pleasing others, than by reproducing the merriment which throughout a long life was occasioned by her, who of all the Aunt Pollies that ever lived, was the Aunt Polly!

HENRY S. HAGERT.

In the olden time of the world there stood on the ocean-border a large and flourishing city, whose winged ships brought daily the costly merchandise of all nations to its overflowing store-houses. It was a place of busy, bustling, turbulent life. Men were struggling fiercely for wealth, and rank, and lofty name. The dawn of day saw them striving each for his own separate and selfish schemes; the stars of midnight looked down in mild rebuke upon the protracted labor of men who gave themselves no time to gaze upon the quiet heavens. One only of all this busy crowd mingled not in their toil—one only idler sauntered carelessly along the thronged mart, or wandered listlessly by the seashore; Adonais alone scorned to bind himself by fetters which he could not fling aside at his own wild will. Those who loved the stripling grieved to see him waste the spring-time of life in thus aimlessly loitering by the way-side; while the old men and sages would fain have taken from him his ill-used freedom, and shut him up in the prison-house where they bestowed their madmen, lest his example should corrupt the youth of the city.

But for all this Adonais cared little. In vain they showed him the craggy path which traversed the hill of Fame; in vain they set him in the foul and miry roads which led to the temple of Mammon. He bowed before their solemn wisdom, but there was a lurking mischief in his glance as he pointed to his slender limbs, and feigned a shudder of disgust at the very sight of these rugged and distasteful ways. So at last he was suffered to wend his own idle course, and save that careful sires sometimes held him up as a warning to their children, his fellow-townsmen almost forgot his existence.

Years passed on, and then a beautiful and stately Fane began to rise in the very heart of the great city. Slowly it rose, and for a while they who toiled so intently at their daily business, marked not the white and polished stones which were so gradually and silently piled together in their midst. It grew, that noble temple, as if by magic. Every morning dawn shed its rose-tints upon another snowy marble which had been fixed in its appointed place beneath the light of the quiet stars. Men wondered somewhat, but they had scarce time to observe, and none to inquire. So the superb fabric had nearly reached its summit ere they heard, with unbelieving ears, that the builder of this noble fane, was none other than Adonais, the idler.

Few gave credence to the tale, for whence could he, the vagrant, and the dreamer, have drawn those precious marbles, encrusted as they were with sculpture still more precious, and written over with characters as inscrutable as they were immortal? Some set themselves to watch for the Fane-builder, but their eyes were heavy, and at the magic hour when the artist took up his labors, their senses were fast locked in slumber. Yet silently, even as the temple of the mighty Solomon, in which was never heard the sound of the workman's tool, so rose that mystic fane. Not until it stood in grand relief against the clear blue sky; not until its lofty dome pierced the clouds even a mountain-top; not until its polished walls were fashioned within and without, to surpassing beauty, did men learn the truth, and behold in the despised Adonais, the wonder-working Fane-builder. In his wanderings the dreamer had lighted on the entrance to that exhaustless mine, whence men of like soul have drawn their riches for all time. The hidden treasures of poesy had been given to his grasp, and he had built a temple which should long outlast the sand-heaps which the worshipers of Mammon had gathered around them.

But even then, when pilgrims came from afar to gaze upon the noble fane, the men of his own kindred and people stood aloof. They cared not for this adornment of their birth-place—they valued not the treasures that had there been gathered together. Only the few who entered the vestibule, and saw the sparkle of jewels which decked the inner shrine, or they to whom the pilgrims recounted the priceless value of these gems in other lands—only they began to look with something like pride upon the dreamer Adonais.

But not without purpose had the Fane-builder reared this magnificent structure. Within those costly walls was a veiled and jeweled sanctuary. There had he enshrined an idol—the image of a bright divinity which he alone might worship. Willingly and freely did he admit the pilgrim and the wayfarer to the outer courts of his temple; gladly did he offer them refreshing draughts from the fountain of living water which gushed up in its midst; but never did he suffer them to enter that "Holy of holies;" never did their eyes rest on that enshrined idol, in whose honor all these treasures were gathered together.

In progress of time, when Adonais had lavished all his wealth upon his temple, and when with the toil of gathering and shaping out her treasures, his strength had well-nigh failed him, there came a troop of revilers and slanderers—men of evil tongue, who swore that the Fane-builder was no better than a midnight robber, and had despoiled other temples of all that adorned his own. The tale was as false and foul as they who coined it; but when they pointed to many pigmy fanes which now began to be reared[39] about the city, and when men saw that they were built of like marbles as those which glittered in the temple of Adonais, they paused not to mark that the fairest stones in these new structures were but the imperfect sculptures which the true artist had scorned to employ, or perhaps the chippings of some rare gem which in his affluence he could fling aside. So the tale was hearkened unto and believed. They whose dim perceptions had been bewildered by this new uncoined and uncoinable wealth, were glad to think that it had belonged to some far off time, or some distant region. The envious, the sordid, the cold, all listened well-pleased to the base slander; and they who had cared little for his glory made themselves strangely busy in spreading the story of his shame.

Patiently and unweariedly had the dreamer labored at his pleasant task, while the temple was gradually growing up toward the heavens; skillfully had he polished the rich marbles, and graven upon them the ineffaceable characters of truth. But the jeweled adornments of the inner shrine had cost him more than all his other toil, for with his very heart's blood had he purchased those costly gems that sparkled on his soul's idol. Now wearied and worn with by-gone suffering he had no strength to stand forth and defy his revilers. Proudly and silently he withdrew from the world, and entered into his own beautiful fane. Presently men beheld that a heavy stone had been piled against the door of the inner sanctuary, and upon its polished surface was inscribed these words: "To Time the Avenger!"

From that day no one ever again beheld the dreamer. Pilgrims came as before, and rested within the vestibule, and drank of the springing fountain, but they no longer saw the dim outline of the veiled goddess in the distant shrine, only the white and ghastly glitter of that threatening stone, which seemed like the portal of a tomb, met their eyes.

Thus years passed on, and men had almost forgotten the name of him who had wasted himself in such fruitless toil. At length there came one from a country far beyond the seas, who had set forth to explore the wonders of all lands. He lacked the pious reverence of the pilgrims, but he also lacked the cold indifference of those who dwelt within the shadow of the temple. He entered the mystic fane, he gazed with unsated eye upon the treasures it contained, and his soul sought for greater beauty. With daring hand he and his companions thrust aside the marble portal which guarded the sanctuary. At first they shrunk back, dazzled and awe-stricken as the blaze of rich light met their unhallowed gaze. Again they went forward, and then what saw they? Surrounded by the sheen of jewels—glowing in the gorgeous light of the diamond, the chrysolite, the beryl, the ruby, they found an image fashioned but of common clay, while extended at its feet lay the skeleton of the Fane-builder.

Worn with toil, and pain, and disappointment, he had perished at the feet of his idol. It may be that the scorn of the world had opened his eyes to behold of what mean materials was shapen the divinity he had so honored. It may be that the glitter of the gems he had heaped around it had perpetuated the delusion which had first charmed him, and he had thus been saved the last, worst pang of wasted idolatry. It matters not. He died—as all such men must die—in sorrow and in loneliness.

But the fane he has reared is as indestructible as the soul of him who lifted its lofty summit to the skies. "Time, the Avenger," has redeemed the builder's fame; and even the men of his own nation now believe that a prophet and a seer once dwelt among them.

When that great city shall have shared the fortunes of the Babylons and Ninevahs of olden time, that snow-white fane, written all over with characters of truth, and graven with images of beauty, will yet endure; and men of new times and new states shall learn lessons of holier and loftier existence from a pilgrimage to that glorious temple, built by spirit-toil, and consecrated by spirit-worship and spirit-suffering.

Whether it was cotton or tallow that laid the foundations of Mr. Fairchild's fortunes we forget—for people have no right now-a-days to such accurate memories—but it was long ago, when Mrs. Fairchild was contented and humble, and Mr. Fairchild happy in the full stretch of his abilities to make the two ends meet—days which had long passed away. A sudden turn of fortune's wheel had placed them on new ground. Mr. Fairchild toiled, and strained, and struggled to follow up fortune's favors, and was successful. The springs of life had well-nigh been consumed in the eager and exhausting contest; and now, breathless and worn, he paused to be happy. One half of life he had thus devoted to the one object, meaning when that object was obtained to enjoy the other half, supposing that happiness, like every thing else, was to be bought.

Mrs. Fairchild's ideas had jumped with her husband's fortunes. Once she only wanted additional pantries and a new carpet for her front parlor, to be perfectly happy. Now, a grand house in a grand avenue was indispensable. Once, she only wished to be a little finer than Mrs. Simpkins; now, she ardently desired to forget she ever knew Mrs. Simpkins; and what was harder, to make Mrs. Simpkins forget she had ever known her. In short, Mrs. Fairchild had grown fine, and meant to be fashionable. And why not? Her house was as big as any body's. Her husband gave her carte blanche for furniture, and the mirrors, and gilding, and candelabras, were enough to put your eyes out.

She was very busy, and talked very grand to the shopmen, who were very obsequious, and altogether was very happy.

"I don't know what to do with this room, or how to furnish it," she said to her husband one day, as they were going through the house. There are the two drawing-rooms, and the dining-room—but this fourth room seems of no use—I would make a keeping-room of it, but that it has only that one large window that looks back—and I like a cheerful look-out where I sit—why did you build it so?"

"I don't know," he replied, "it's just like Ashfield's house next door, and so I supposed it must be right, and I told the workmen to follow the same plan as his."

"Ashfield's!" said Mrs. Fairchild, looking up with a new idea, "I wonder what use they put it to."

"A library, I believe. I think the head carpenter told me so."

"A library! Well, then, let's us have a library," she said. "Book-cases would fill those walls very handsomely."

He looked at her for a moment, and said,

"But the books?"

"Oh, we can get those," she replied. "I'll go this very morning to Metcalf about the book-cases."

So forthwith she ordered the carriage, and drove to the cabinet-maker's.

"Mr. Metcalf," she said with her grandest air, (for as at present she had to confine her grandeur to her trades-people, she gave them full measure, for which, however, they charged her full price,) "I want new book-cases for my library—I want your handsomest and most expensive kind."

The man bowed civilly, and asked if she preferred the Gothic or Egyptian pattern.

Gothic or Egyptian! Mrs. Fairchild was nonplused. What did he mean by Gothic and Egyptian? She would have given the world to ask, but was ashamed.

"I have not made up my mind," she replied, after some hesitation, (her Egyptian ideas being drawn from the Bible, were not of the latest date, and so she thought of Pharaoh) and added, "but Gothic, I believe"—for Gothic at least was untrenched ground, and she had no prejudices of any kind to combat there—"which, however, are the most fashionable?" she continued.

"Why I make as many of the one as the other," he replied. "Mr. Ashfield's are Egyptian, Mr. Campden's Gothic."

Now the Ashfields were her grand people. She did not know them, but she meant to. They lived next door, and she thought nothing would be easier. They were not only rich, but fashionable. He was a man of talent and information, (but that the Fairchilds knew nothing about,) head of half the literary institutions, a person of weight and influence in all circles. She was very pretty and very elegant—dressing beautifully, and looking very animated and happy; and Mrs. Fairchild often gazed at her as she drove from the door, (for the houses joined,) and made up her mind to be very intimate as soon as she was "all fixed."

"The Ashfields have Egyptian," she repeated, and Pharaoh faded into insignificance before such grand authority—and so she ordered Egyptian too.

"Not there," said Mrs. Fairchild, "you need not measure there," as the cabinet-maker was taking the dimensions of her rooms. "I shall have a looking-glass there."

"A mirror in a library!" said the man of rule and inches, with a tone of surprise that made Mrs. Fairchild color. "Did you wish a mirror here, ma'am," he added, more respectfully.

"No, no," she replied quickly, "go on"—for she felt at once that he had seen the inside of more libraries than she had.

Her ideas received another illumination from the[42] upholsterer, as she was looking at blue satin for a curtain to the one large window which opened on a conservatory, who said,

"Oh, it's for a library window; then cloth, I presume, madam, is the article you wish."

"Cloth!" she repeated, looking at him.

"Yes," he replied; "we always furnish libraries with cloth. Heavy, rich materials is considered more suitable for such a purpose than silk."

Mrs. Fairchild was schooled again. However, Mr. Ashfield was again the model.

And now the curtains were up, and the cases home, and all but the books there, which being somewhat essential to a library, Mrs. Fairchild said to her husband,

"My dear, you must buy some books. I want to fill these cases and get this room finished."

"I will," he replied. "There's an auction to-night. I'll buy a lot."

"An auction," she said, hesitatingly. "Is that the best place? I don't think the bindings will be apt to be handsome of auction books."

"I can have them rebound," he answered.

"But you cannot tell whether they will fit these shelves," she continued, anxiously. "I think you had better take the measure of the shelves, and go to some book-store, and then you can choose them accordingly."

"I see Ashfield very often at book auctions," he persisted, to which she innocently replied,

"Oh, yes—but he knows what he is buying, we don't;" to which unanswerable argument Mr. Fairchild had nothing to say. And so they drove to a great book importers, and ordered the finest books and bindings that would suit their measurements.

And now they were at last, as Mrs. Fairchild expressed it, "all fixed." Mr. Fairchild had paid and dismissed the last workman—she had home every article she could think of—and now they were to sit down and enjoy.

The succeeding weeks passed in perfect quiet—and, it must be confessed, profound ennui.

"I wish people would begin to call," said Mrs. Fairchild, with an impatient yawn. "I wonder when they will."

"There seems to be visiting enough in the street," said Mr. Fairchild, as he looked out at the window. "There seems no end of Ashfield's company."

"I wish some of them would call here," she replied sorrowfully.

"We are not fine enough for them, I suppose," he answered, half angrily.

"Not fine enough!" she ejaculated with indignant surprise. "We not fine enough! I am sure this is the finest house in the Avenue. And I don't believe there is such furniture in town."

Mr. Fairchild made no reply, but walked the floor impatiently.

"Do you know Mr. Ashfield?" she presently ask.

"Yes," he replied; "I meet him on 'change constantly."

"I wonder, then, why she does not call," she said, indignantly. "It's very rude in her, I am sure. We are the last comers."

And the weeks went on, and Mr. Fairchild without business, and Mrs. Fairchild without gossip, had a very quiet, dull time of it in their fine house.

"I wish somebody would call," had been repeated again and again in every note of ennui, beginning in impatience and ending in despair.

Mr. Fairchild grew angry. His pride was hurt. He looked upon himself as especially wronged by his neighbor Ashfield. The people opposite, too—"who were they, that the Ashfields were so intimate with them? The Hamiltons! Why he could buy them over and over again! Hamilton's income was nothing."

At last Mrs. Fairchild took a desperate resolution, "Why should not we call first? We'll never get acquainted in this way," which declaration Mr. Fairchild could not deny. And so she dressed one morning in her finest and drove round with a pack of cards.

Somehow she found every body "out." But that was not much, for, to tell the truth, her heart did beat a little at the idea of entering strange drawing-rooms and introducing herself, and she would be sure to be at home when they returned her calls; and that would be less embarrassing, and suit her views quite as well.

In the course of a few days cards were left in return.

"But, Lawrence, I told you to say I was at home." said Mrs. Fairchild, impatiently, as the servant handed her half a dozen cards.

"I did, ma'am," he replied.

"You did," she said, "then how is this?"

"I don't know, ma'am," he replied, "but the foot-man gave me the cards and said all was right."

Mrs. Fairchild flushed and looked disconcerted.

Before a fortnight had elapsed she called again; but this time her cards remained unnoticed.

"Who on earth is this Mrs. Fairchild?" said Mrs. Leslie Herbert to Mrs. Ashfield, "who is forever leaving her cards."

"The people who built next to us," replied Mrs. Ashfield. "I don't know who they are."

"What an odd idea," pursued the other, "to be calling once a week in this way. I left my card after the first visit; but if the little woman means to call every other day in this way, I shall not call again."

And so Mrs. Fairchild was dismissed from the minds of her new neighbors, while she sat in anxious wonderment at their not calling again.

Though Mr. Fairchild was no longer in business, yet he had property to manage, and could still walk down town and see some business acquaintances, and inquire into stocks, and lots, and other interesting matters; but poor Mrs. Fairchild had fairly nothing to do. She was too rich to sew. She could buy every thing she wanted. She had but two children, and they could not occupy all her time; and her house and furniture were so new, and her servants so many, that housekeeping was a mere name. As to reading, that never formed any part of either[43] her or Mr. Fairchild's pleasures. They did not even know the names of half the books they had. He read the papers, which was more than she did beyond the list of deaths and marriages—and so she felt as if she would die in her grandeur for something to do, and somebody to see. We are not sure but that Mrs. Simpkins would have been most delightedly received if she had suddenly walked in upon her. But this Mrs. Simpkins had no idea of doing. The state of wrath and indignation in which Mrs. Fairchild had left her old friends and acquaintances is not easily to be described.

"She had begun to give herself airs," they said, "even before she left ---- street; and if she had thought herself a great lady then, in that little box, what must she be now?" said Mrs. Thompson, angrily.

"I met her not long ago in a store, and she pretended not to see me," replied Mrs Simpkins. "So I shall not trouble myself to call," she continued, with considerable dignity of manner; not telling, however, that she had called soon after Mrs. Fairchild moved, and her visit had never been returned.

"Oh, I am sure," said the other, "I don't want to visit her if she don't want to visit me;" which, we are sorry to say, Mrs. Thompson, was a story, for you know you were dying to get in the house and see and "hear all about it."

To which Mrs. Simpkins responded,

"That, for her part, she did not care about it—there was no love lost between them;" and these people, who had once been kind and neighborly friends, would not have been sorry to hear that Mr. Fairchild had failed—or rather would have been glad (which people mean when they say, "they would not be sorry,") to see them humbled in any way.

So much for Mrs. Fairchild's first step in prosperity.

Mrs. Fairchild pined and languished for something to do, and somebody to see. The memory of early habits came strongly over her at times, and she longed to go in the kitchen and make a good batch of pumpkin pies, by way of amusement; but she did not dare. Her stylish pampered menials already suspected she was "nobody," and constantly quoted the privileges of Mrs. Ashfield's servants, and the authority of other fashionable names, with the impertinence and contempt invariably felt by inferiors for those who they instinctively know to be ignorant and vulgar, and "not to the manor born."

She accidently, to her great delight, came across a young mantuamaker, who occasionally sewed at Mrs. Ashfield's; and she engaged her at once to come and make her some morning-dresses; not that she wanted them, only the opportunity for the gossip to be thence derived. And to those who know nothing of the familiarity with which ladies can sometimes condescend to question such persons, it would be astonishing to know the quantity of information she extracted from Miss Hawkins. Not only of Mrs. Ashfield's mode of living, number of dresses, &c., but of many other families of the neighborhood, particularly the Misses Hamilton, who were described to be such "nice young ladies," and for whom she chiefly sewed, as "Mrs. Ashfield chiefly imported most of her dresses," but she lent all her patterns to the Miss Hamiltons; and Miss Hawkins made up all their dresses after hers, only not of such expensive materials. And thus she found out all the Hamiltons' economies, which filled her with contempt and indignation—contempt for their poverty, and indignation at their position in society, and the company they saw notwithstanding.

She could not understand it. Her husband sympathized with her most fully on this score, for, like all ignorant, purse-proud men, he could comprehend no claims not based in money.

A sudden light broke in, however, upon the Fairchild's dull life. A great exertion was being made for a new Opera company, and Mr. Fairchild's money being as good as any body else's, the subscription books were taken to him. He put down his name for as large a sum as the best of them, and felt himself at once a patron of music, fashion, and the fine arts.

Mrs. Fairchild was in ecstasies. She had chosen seats in the midst of the Ashfields, Harpers, and others, and felt now "that they would be all together."

Mr. Fairchild came home one day very indignant with a young Mr. Bankhead, who had asked him if he would change seats with him, saying his would probably suit Mr. Fairchild better than those he had selected, as they were front places, &c., that his only object in wishing to change was to be next to the Ashfields, "as it would be a convenience to his wife, who could then go often with them when he was otherwise engaged."

Mr. Fairchild promptly refused in what Mr. Bankhead considered a rude manner, who rather haughtily replied "that he should not have offered the exchange if he had supposed it was a favor, his seats being generally considered the best. It was only on his wife's account, who wished to be among her friends that he had asked it, as he presumed the change would be a matter of indifference to Mr. Fairchild."

The young man had no idea of the sting conveyed in these words. Mrs. Fairchild was very angry when her husband repeated it to her. "It was not a matter of indifference at all. Why should not we wish to be among the Ashfields and Harpers as well as anybody?" she said, indignantly. "And who is this Mrs. Bankhead, I should like to know, that I am to yield my place to her;" to which Mr. Fairchild replied, with his usual degree of angry contempt when speaking of people of no property,

"A pretty fellow, indeed! He's hardly worth salt to his porridge! Indeed, I wonder how he is able to pay for his seats at all!"

While on the Bankhead's side it was,

"We cannot change our places, Mrs. Ashfield. Those Fairchilds refused."

"Oh, how provoking!" was the reply. "We should have been such a nice little set by ourselves. And so disagreeable, too, to have people one don't[44] know right in the midst of us so! Why what do the creatures mean—your places are the best?"

"Oh, I don't know. He 's a vulgar, purse-proud man. My husband was quite sorry he had asked him, for he seemed to think it was a great favor, and made the most of the opportunity to be rude."

"Well, I am sorry. It's not pleasant to have such people near one; and then I am so very, very sorry, not to have you and Mr. Bankhead with us. The Harpers were saying how delightful it would be for us all to be together; and now to have those vulgar people instead—too provoking!"

Ignorant, however, of the disgust, in which her anticipated proximity was held, Mrs. Fairchild, in high spirits, bought the most beautiful of white satin Opera cloaks, and ordered the most expensive paraphernalia she could think of to make it all complete, and determined on sporting diamonds that would dazzle old acquaintances, (if any presumed to be there,) and make even the fashionables stare.

The first night opened with a very brilliant house. Every body was there, and every body in full dress. Mrs. Fairchild had as much as she could do to look around. To be sure she knew nobody, but then it was pleasant to see them all. She learnt a few names from the conversation that she overheard of the Ashfields and Harpers, as they nodded to different acquaintances about the house. And then, during the intervals, different friends came and chatted a little while with them, and the Bankheads leaned across and exchanged a few animated words; and, in short, every body seemed so full of talk, and so intimate with every body, except poor Mrs. Fairchild, who sat, loaded with finery, and no one to speak to but her husband, who was by this time yawning wearily, well-nigh worn out with the fatigue of hearing two acts of a grand Italian Opera.

As Mrs. Fairchild began to recover self-possession enough to comprehend what was going on among them, she found to her surprise, from their conversation, that the music was not all alike; that one singer was "divine," another "only so so;" the orchestra admirable, and the choruses very indifferent. She could not comprehend how they could tell one from another. "They all sang at the same time; and as for the chorus and orchestra, she did not know 'which was which.'"

Then there was a great deal said about "contraltos" and "sopranos;" and when her husband asked her what they meant, she replied, "she did not know, it was French!" They talked, too, of Rossini and Bellini, and people who read and wrote music, and that quite passed her comprehension. She thought "music was only played and sung;" and what they meant by reading and writing it, she could not divine. Had they talked of eating it, it would have sounded to her about as rational.

Occasionally one of the Hamiltons sat with some of the set, for it seemed they had no regular places of their own. "Of course not," said Mrs Fairchild, contemptuously. "They can't afford it," which expressive phrase summed up, with both husband and wife, the very essence of all that was mean and contemptible, and she was only indignant at their being able to come there at all. The Bankheads were bad enough; but to have the Hamiltons there too, and then to hear them all talking French with some foreigners who occasionally joined them, really humbled her.

This, then, she conceived was the secret of success. "They know French," she would reply in a voice of infinite mortification, when her husband expressed his indignant astonishment at finding these "nobodies" on 'change, "somebodies" at the Opera. To "know French," comprehended all her ideas of education, information, sense, and literature. This, then, she thought was the "Open Sesame" of "good society," the secret of enjoyment at the Opera; for, be it understood, all foreign languages were "French" to Mrs. Fairchild.

She was beginning to find the Opera a terrible bore, spite of all the finery she sported and saw around her, with people she did not know, and music she did not understand. As for Mr. Fairchild, the fatigue was intolerable; and he would have rebelled at once, if he had not paid for his places for the season, and so chose to have his money's worth, if it was only in tedium.

A bright idea, a bold resolution occurred to Mrs. Fairchild. She would learn French.

So she engaged a teacher at once, at enormous terms, who was to place her on a level with the best of them.

Poor little woman! and poor teacher, too! what work it was! How he groaned in spirit at the thick tongue that could not pronounce the delicate vowels, and the dull apprehension that knew nothing of moods and tenses.

And she, poor little soul, who was as innocent of English Grammar as of murder, how was she to be expected to understand the definite and indefinite when it was all indefinite; and as for the participle past, she did not believe any body understood it. And so she worked and puzzled, and sometimes almost cried, for a week, and then went to the Opera and found she was no better off than before.

In despair, and angry with her teacher, she dismissed him. "She did not believe any body ever learnt it that way out of books;" and "so she would get a French maid, and she'd learn more hearing her talk in a month, than Mr. A. could teach her, if she took lessons forever." And so she got a maid, who brought high recommendations from some grand people who had brought her from France, and then she thought herself quite set up.

But the experiment did not succeed. She turned out a saucy thing, who shrugged her shoulders with infinite contempt when she found "madame" did not comprehend her; and soon Mrs. Fairchild was very glad to take advantage of a grand flare-up in the kitchen between her and the cook, in which the belligerent parties declared that "one or the other must leave the house," to dismiss her.

In deep humility of spirit Mrs. Fairchild placed her little girl at the best French school in the city, almost grudging the poor child her Sundays at home[45] when she must hear nothing but English. She was determined that she should learn French young; for she now began to think it must be taken like measles or whooping-cough, in youth, or else the attack must be severe, if not dangerous.

Mrs. Fairchild made no acquaintances, as she fondly hoped, at the Opera. A few asked, "Who is that dressy little body who sits in front of you, Mrs. Ashfield?"

"A Mrs. Fairchild. I know nothing about them except that they live next door to us."

"What a passion the little woman seems to have for jewelry," remarked the other. "It seems to me she has a new set of something once a week at least."

"Yes," said one of the Hamiltons, laughing, "she's as good as a jeweler's window. It's quite an amusement to me to see the quantity of bracelets and chains she contrives to hang around her."

"I would gladly have dispensed with that amusement, Ellen," replied Mrs. Ashfield, "for they have the places the Bankheads wanted; and he is so clever and well-informed, and she such a bright, intelligent little creature, that it would have added so much to our pleasure to have had them with us."

"Oh, to be sure! the Bankheads are jewels of the first water. And how they enjoy every thing. What a shame it is they have not those Fairchilds' money."

"No, no, Ellen, that is not fair," replied Mrs. Ashfield. "Let Mrs. Fairchild have her finery—it's all, I suppose, the poor woman has. The Bankheads don't require wealth for either enjoyment or consequence. They are bright and flashing in their own lustre, and like all pure brilliants, are the brighter for their simple setting."

"May be," replied the gay Ellen, "but I do love to see some people have every thing."

"Nay, Ellen," said Mrs. Ashfield, "Is that quite just? Be satisfied with Mrs. Bankhead's having so much more than Mrs. Fairchild, without robbing poor Mrs. Fairchild of the little she has."

Could Mrs. Fairchild have believed her ears had she heard this? Could she have believed that little Mrs. Bankhead, whose simple book-muslin and plainly braided dark hair excited her nightly contempt, was held in such respect and admiration by those who would not know her. And Bankhead, whom her husband spoke of with such infinite contempt, as having "nothing at all," "not salt to his porridge." And yet as Mrs. Fairchild saw them courted and gay, she longed for some of their porridge, "for they knew French."

And thus the season wore on in extreme weariness and deep mortification. The Fairchilds made no headway at all. She made no acquaintances at all at the opera, as she had fondly hoped. She even regretted that her husband had refused their seats to the Bankheads. Had he yielded them a favor may be they would have spoken to them.

Desperate, at last, she determined she would do something. She would give a party. But who to ask?

Not old friends and acquaintance. That was not to be thought of. But who else? She knew nobody.

"It was not necessary to know them," she told her husband. "She would send her card and invitations to all those fine people, and they'd be glad enough to come. The Bankheads, too, and the Hamiltons, she would ask them."

"You are sure of them, at any rate," said her husband contemptuously. "Poor devils! it's not often they get such a supper as they'll get here."

But somehow the Hamiltons and Bankheads were not as hungry as Mr. Fairchild supposed, for very polite regrets came in the course of a few days, to Mrs. Fairchild's great wrath and mortification.

This was but the beginning, however. Refusals came pouring in thick and fast from all quarters.

The lights were prepared, the music sounding, and some half dozen ladies, whose husbands had occasionally a business transaction with Mr. Fairchild, looked in on their way to a grand fashionable party given the same evening by one of their own clique, and then vanished, leaving Mrs. Fairchild with the mortified wish that they had not come at all, to see the splendor of preparations and the beggary of guests. Some few young men dropped in and took a look, and bowed themselves out as soon as the Fairchilds gave them a chance; and so ended this last and most desperate effort.

"My dear," said Mrs. Fairchild one day to her husband in perfect desperation, "let us go to Europe."

"To Europe," he said, looking up in amazement.

"Yes," she replied, with energy. "That's what all these fine people have done, and that's the way they know each other so well. All the Americans are intimate in Paris, and then when they come back they are all friends together."

Mr. Fairchild listened and pondered. He was as tired as his wife with nothing to do; and moreover deeply mortified, though he said less about it, at not being admitted among those with whom he had no tastes or associations in common, and he consented.

The house was shut up and the Fairchilds were off.

"Who are those Fairchilds," asked somebody in Paris, "that one sees every where, where money can gain admittance?"

"Oh, I don't know," replied Miss Rutherford. "They traveled down the Rhine with us last summer, and were our perfect torment. We could not shake them off."

"What sort of people are they?" was the next question.

"Ignorant past belief: but that would not so much matter if she were not such a spiteful little creature. I declare I heard more gossip and ill-natured stories from her about Americans in Paris than I ever heard in all the rest of my life put together."

"And rich?"

"Yes, I suppose so—for they spent absurdly. They are just those ignorant, vulgar people that one only meets in traveling, and that make us blush for our country and countrymen. Such people should not have passports."

"Fairchild," said Mrs. Castleton. "The name is[46] familiar to me. Oh, now I remember. But they can't be the same. The Fairchilds I knew were people in humble circumstances. They lived in —— street."

"Yes. I dare say they are the very people," replied Miss Rutherford. "He has made money rapidly within a few years."

"But she was the best little creature I ever knew," persisted Mrs. Castleton. "My baby was taken ill while we were in the country boarding at the same house, and this Mrs. Fairchild came to me at once, and helped me get a warm bath, and watched and nursed the child with me as if it had been her own. I remember I was very grateful for her excessive kindness and attention."

"Well, I dare say," replied Miss Rutherford. "But that was when she was poor, and, as you say, humble, Mrs. Castleton. Very probably she may have been kind-hearted originally. She does love her children dearly. She has that merit; but now that she is rich, and wants to be fine and fashionable, and don't know how to manage it, and can't succeed, you never knew any body so spiteful and jealous as she is of all those she feels beyond her reach."

"Pity," said Mrs. Castleton almost sorrowfully. "She was such a good little creature. How prosperity spoils some people."

And so Mrs. Fairchild traveled and came home again.

They had been to Paris, and seen more things and places than they could remember, and did not understand what they could remember, and were afraid of telling what they had seen, lest they should mispronounce names, whose spelling was beyond their most ambitious flights.

They had gone to the ends of the earth to be in society at home. But ignorant they went and ignorant they returned.

"Edward and Fanny shall know every thing," said Mrs. Fairchild, and teachers without end were engaged for the young Fairchilds, who, to their parents' great delight were not only chatting in "unknown tongues," but becoming quite intimate with the little Ashfields and other baby sprigs of nobility.

"Who is that pretty boy dancing with your Helen, Mrs. Bankhead?" asked some one at a child's party.

"Young Fairchild," was the reply.

"Fairchild! What, a son of that overdressed little woman you used to laugh at so at the opera?" said the other.

"The same," replied Mrs. Bankhead laughing.

"And here's an incipient flirtation between your girl and her boy," continued the other archly.

"Well, there's no leveler like Education. The true democrat after all," she pursued.

"Certainly," replied Mrs. Bankhead. "Intelligence puts us all on a footing. What other distinction can or should we have?"

"I doubt whether Mrs. Fairchild thinks so," replied her friend.

"Indeed you are mistaken," replied Mrs. Bankhead earnestly. "She would not perhaps express it in those words: but her humble reverence for education is quite touching. They are giving these children every possible advantage, and in a few years, when they are grown up," she continued, laughing, "We mothers will be very glad to admit the young Fairchilds in society, even if they must bring the mother with them."

"I suppose so," said the other. "And old people are inoffensive even if they are ignorant. Old age is in itself a claim to respect."

"True enough," returned Mrs. Bankhead; "and when you see them engrossed and happy in the success of their children, you forgive them a good deal. That is the reward of such people."

"They have fought through a good deal of mortification though to attain it," rejoined the other. "I wonder whether the end is worth it?"

"Ah! that's a question hard to settle," replied Mrs. Bankhead seriously. "Society at large is certainly improved, but I doubt whether individuals are the happier. No doubt the young Fairchilds will be happier for their parents' rise in the world—but I should say the 'transition state' had been any thing but a pleasant one to the parents. The children will have the tastes as well as the means for enjoyment; the one Mrs. Fairchild having found to be quite as necessary as the other."

"This is the march of intellect, the progress of society, exemplified in the poor Fairchilds," replied the other laughing. "Well, thank Heaven my mission has not been to rise in the world."

Never was country more fruitful than our own with rich materials of romantic and tragic interest, to call into exercise the finest talents of the dramatist and novelist. Every cliff and headland has its aboriginal legend; the village, now thrifty and quiet, had its days of slaughter and conflagration, its tale of devoted love or cruel treachery; while the city, now tumultuous with the pressure of commerce, in its "day of small things," had its bombardment and foreign army, and its handful of determined freemen, who achieved prodigies of single handed valor. Now that men are daily learning the worth of humanity, its hopes and its trials coming nearer home to thought and affection; now that the complicated passions of refined and artificial life are becoming less important than the broad, deep, genuine manifestations of the common mind, we may hope for a bolder and more courageous literature: we may hope to see the drama free itself from sensualism and frivolity, and rise to the Shaksperian dignity of true passion; while the romance will learn better its true ground, and will create, rather than portray—delineate, rather than dissect human sentiment and emotion.

The State of Maine is peculiarly rich in its historically romantic associations. Settled as it was prior to the landing of the Pilgrims, first under Raleigh Gilbert, and subsequently by Sir Ferdinando Gorges, whose colony it is fair, in the absence of testimony, to infer never left the country after 1616, but continued to employ themselves in the fisheries, and in some commerce with the West Indies, up to the time of their final incorporation with the Plymouth settlement. Indeed the correspondence of Sir Richard Vines, governor of the colony under Sir Ferdinando Gorges, with the Governor of Plymouth, leaves no doubt upon this head; and it is a well known fact that the two settlements of De Aulney and De la Tour at the mouths of the Penobscot and Kennebec rivers, even at this early age, were far from being contemptible, both in a commercial and numeric point of view. Added to these was the handful of Jesuits at Mont Desert, and we might say a colony of Swedes on the sea-coast, between the two large rivers just named, the memory of which is traditional, and the vestiges of which are sometimes turned up by the ploughshare. These people probably fell beneath some outbreak of savage vengeance, which left no name or record of their existence.

Subsequently to these was the dispersion of the Acadians, that terrible and wanton piece of political policy, which resulted in the extinction and denationalizing of a simple and pious people. The fugitive Acadians found their way through a wilderness of forests, suffering and dying as they went, some landing in distant states, (five hundred having been consigned to Governor Oglethorpe of Georgia,) and others, lonely and bereft, found a home with the humble and laborious farmers of this hardy state, whose finest quality is an open-handed hospitality. These intermarrying with our people here, have left traces of their blood and fine moral qualities to enhance the excellence of a pure and healthful population.

Then followed the times of the Revolution, when Maine did her part nobly in the great and perilous work. Our own Knox was commandant of the artillery, and the bosom friend of Washington: our youth sunk into unknown graves in the sacred cause of freedom; and our people, poor as they were, for the resources of the state were then undeveloped, cast their mite of wealth into the national treasury. Northerly and isolated as she is, her cities were burned, and her frontiers jealously watched by an alert and cruel enemy. Here, too, Arnold sowed his last seeds of virtue and patriotism, in his arduous march through the wilderness of Maine to the capital of the Canadas, an exploit which, considering the season, the poverty of numbers and resources, combined with the wild, unknown, and uncleared state of the country, may compete with the most heroic actions of any great leader of any people.

A maritime state, Maine suffers severely from the fluctuations of commerce, but is the first to realize the reactions of prosperity. Her extended seaboard, her vast forests, her immense mineral resources, together with a population hardy, laborious, virtuous, and enterprising; a population less adulterated by foreign admixture than any state in the Union, all point to a coming day of power and prosperity which shall place her foremost in the ranks of the states, in point of wealth, as she is already in that of intelligence.

We have enumerated but a tithe of the intellectual resources of Maine—have given but a blank sheet as it were of the material which will hereafter make[48] her renowned in story, and must confine ourselves to but a single point of historic and romantic interest, connected with the earlier records of the country. We have alluded to the first governor, Sir Richard Vines, a right worthy and chivalric gentleman, the friend and agent of Sir Ferdinando Gorges, of Walter Raleigh, and other fine spirits of the day. His residence was at the Pool, as it is now called, or "Winter Harbor," from the fact that the winter of 1616-17 was passed by Vines and his followers at this place. After a residence of eighteen or twenty years, devoted to the interests of the colony, the death of his patron, the transfer of the Maine plantation to the Plymouth proprietors, together with domestic and pecuniary misfortunes, induced Sir Richard Vines to retire to the Island of Barbadoes, where we find him prosperous and respected, and still mindful of the colony for which he had done and suffered so much.

Prior to his departure, and probably not altogether unconnected with it, he had incurred the deadly hatred of John Bonyton, a young man of the colony, who in after years was called, and is still remembered in tradition as the "Sagamore of Saco." The cause of this hatred was in some way connected with the disappearance of Bridget Vines, the daughter of the governor, for whom John Bonyton had conceived a wild and passionate attachment. Years before our story she had been suddenly missing, to the permanent grief and dismay of the family, and the more terrible agony of John Bonyton, who had conceived the idea that Bridget had been sent to a European convent, to save her from his presence. This idea he would never abandon, notwithstanding the most solemn denials of Sir Richard, and the most womanly and sympathizing asseverations of Mistress Vines. The youth listened with compressed lip, his large, remarkable eye fixed with stern and searching scrutiny upon the face of the speaker, and when he was done the reply was always the same, "God knows if this be true; but, true or false, my hand shall be against every man till she be found."

Accordingly we find the youth, who seems to have been possessed of those rare and strong points of character which go to make the hero, in constant collision with the people of the times. Moody and revengeful, he became an alien to his father's house, and with gun and dog passed months in the wildest regions of that wild country. With the savage he slept in his wigwam, he threaded the forest and stood upon the verge of the cataract; or penetrated up to the stormy regions of the White Mountains; and anon, hushed the tumultuous beatings of his heart in accordance with the stroke of his paddle, as he and his red companions glided over that loveliest of lakes, Winnépisógé, or "the smile of the Great Spirit."

There seemed no rest for the unhappy man. Unable to endure the formalities and intermedlings, which so strongly mark the period, he spent most of his time on the frontiers of the settlement, admitting of little companionship, and yielding less of courtesy. When he appeared in the colony, the women regarded his fine person, his smile, at once sorrowful and tender, and his free, noble bearing with admiration, not unmingled with terror; while men, even in that age of manly physique looked upon his frame, lithe yet firm as iron, athletic and yet graceful, with eyes of envious delight. Truth to say, John Bonyton had never impaired a fine development by any useful employment, or any elaborate attempts at book-knowledge. He knew all that was essential for the times, or the mode of life which he had adopted, and further he cared not. His great power consisted in a passionate yet steady will, by which all who came within his sphere found themselves bent to his purposes.

The Pilgrims even, unflinching and uncompromising as they were, felt the spell of his presence, and were content to spurn, to persecute, and set a price upon the head of a man whom they could not control. Yet for all this John Bonyton died quietly in his bed, no one daring to do to him even what the law would justify. He slept in perfect security, for he knew this, and knew, too, that the woods were alive with ardent and devoted adherents, who would have deluged the soil with blood had but a hair of his head been injured. The Sagamore of Saco was no ordinary man; and the men of the times, remarkable as they were, felt this; and hence is it, that even to this day his memory is held in remembrance with an almost superstitious awe, and people point out a barrow where lie the ashes of the "Sagamore," and show the boundaries of his land, and tell marvelous tales of his hardihood and self-possession.

They tell of a time when a price had been set upon his head, how, when the people were assembled in the little church for worship, John Bonyton walked in with gun in hand, and stood through the whole service, erect and stern as a man of iron, and no one dared scarcely look upon him, much less lift a finger against him; and how he waited till all had gone forth, even the oracle of God, pale and trembling, and then departed in silence as he came. Surely there was greatness in this—the greatness of a Napoleon, needing but a field for its exercise.

Among the great rivers of Maine the Penobscot and Kennebec stand preëminent, on account of their maritime importance, their depth and adaptability to the purposes of internal navigation; but there are others less known, yet no less essential to the wealth of the country, which, encumbered with falls and rapids, spurn alike ship and steamer, but are invaluable for the great purposes of manufacture. The Androscoggin is one of these, a river, winding, capricious and most beautiful; just the one to touch the fancy of the poet, and tempt the cupidity of a[49] millwright. It abounds with scenery of the most lovely and romantic interest, and falls already in bondage to loom and shuttle. Lewiston Falls, or Pe-jip-scot, as the aboriginals called this beautiful place, are, perhaps, among the finest water plunges in the country. It is not merely the beauty of the river itself, a broad and lengthened sheet of liquid in the heart of a fine country, but the whole region is wild and romantic. The sudden bends of the river present headlands of rare boldness, beneath which the river spreads itself into a placid bay, till ready to gather up its skirts again, and thread itself daintily amid the hills. The banks present slopes and savannas warm and sheltered, in which nestle away finely cultivated farms, and from whence arise those rural sounds of flock and herd so grateful to the spirit, and that primitive blast of horn, winding itself into a thousand echoes, the signal of the in-gathering of a household. Cliffs, crowned with fir, overhang the waters; hills, rising hundreds of feet, cast their dense shadows quite across the stream; and even now the "slim canoe" of the Indian may be seen poised below, while some stern relic of the woods looks upward to the ancient hunting sites of his people, and recalls the day when, at the verge of this very fall, a populous village sent up its council smoke day and night, telling of peace and the uncontested power of his tribe.

But in the times of our story the region stood in its untamed majesty; the whirling mass of waters tumbling and plunging in the midst of an unbroken forest, and the great roar of the cataract booming through the solitude like the unceasing voice of the eternal deep. Men now stand with awe and gaze upon those mysterious falls, vital with traditions terribly beautiful, and again and again ask, "Can they be true? Can it be that beneath these waters, behind that sheet of foam is a room, spacious and vast, and well known, and frequented by the Indian?"

An old man will tell you that one morning as he stood watching the rainbows of the fall, he was surprised at the sudden appearance of an Indian from the very midst of the foam. He accosted him, asked whence he came, and how he escaped the terrible plunge of the descending waves. The Indian, old and white-headed, with the eye of an eagle, and the frame of a Hercules, raised the old man from the ground, shook him fiercely, and then cast him like a reptile to one side. A moment more and the measured stroke of a paddle betrayed the passage of the stout Red Man adown the stream.

Our story must establish the fact in regard to this cave—a fact well known in the earlier records of the country, more than one white man having found himself sufficiently athletic to plunge behind the sheet of water and gain the room.

It was mid-day, and the sun, penetrating the sheet of the falls, cast a not uncheerful light into the cave, the size and gloom of which were still further relieved by a fire burning in the centre, and one or more torches stuck in the fissures of the rocks. Before this fire stood a woman of forty or fifty years of age, gazing intently upon the white, liquid, and tumultuous covering to the door of her home, and yet the expression of her eye showed that her thoughts were far beyond the place in which she stood.

She was taller than the wont of Indian women, more slender than is customary with them at her period of life, and altogether, presented a keenness and springiness of fibre that reminded one of Arab more than aboriginal blood. Her brow was high, retreating, and narrow, with arched and contracted brows, beneath which fairly burned a pair of intense, restless eyes.

At one side, stretched upon skins, appeared what might have been mistaken for a white veil, except that a draft of air caused a portion of it to rise and fall, showing it to be a mass of human hair. Yet so motionless was the figure, so still a tiny moccasoned foot, just perceptible, and so ghastly the hue and abundance of the covering, that all suggested an image of death.

At length the tall woman turned sharply round and addressed the object upon the mats.

"How much longer will you sleep, Skoke? Get up, I tell thee."

At this ungracious speech—for Skoke[13]means snake—the figure started slightly, but did not obey. After some silence she spoke again, "Wa-ain (white soul) get up and eat, our people will soon be here." Still no motion nor reply. At length the woman, in a sharper accent, resumed,

"Bridget Vines, I bid thee arise!" and she laughed in an under tone.

The figure slowly lifted itself up and looked upon the speaker. "Ascáshe,[14] I will answer only to my own name."

"As you like," retorted the other. "Skoke is as good a name as Ascáshe." A truism which the other did not seem disposed to question—the one meaning a snake, the other a spider, or "net-weaver."

Contrary to what might have been expected from the color of the hair, the figure from the mat seemed a mere child in aspect, and yet the eye, the mouth, and the grasp of the hand, indicated not only maturity of years, but the presence of deep and intense passions. Her size was that of a girl of thirteen years in our northern climate, yet the fine bust, the distinct and slender waist, and the firm pressure of the arched foot, revealed maturity as well as individualism of character.

Rising from her recumbent posture, she approached the water at the entrance of the cave till the spray mingled with her long, white locks, and the light falling upon her brow, revealed a sharp beautiful outline of face scarcely touched by years, white, even teeth, and eyes of blue, yet so deeply and sadly kindling into intensity, that they grew momentarily darker and darker as you gazed upon them.

"Water, still water, forever water," she mur[50]mured. Suddenly turning round, she darted away into the recesses of the cave, leaping and flying, as it were, with her long hair tossed to and fro about her person. Presently she emerged, followed by a pet panther, which leaped and bounded in concert with his mistress. Seizing a bow, she sent the arrow away into the black roof of the cavern, waited for its return, and then discharged it again and again, watching its progress with eager and impatient delight. This done, she cast herself again upon the skins, spread her long hair over her form, and lay motionless as marble.

Ascáshe again called, "Why do you not come and eat, Skoke?"

Having no answer, she called out, "Wa-ain, come and eat;" and then tired of this useless teasing, she arose, and shaking the white girl by the arm, cried, "Bridget Vines, I bid you eat."

"I will, Ascáshe," answered the other, taking corn and dried fish, which the other presented.

"The spider caught a bad snake when she wove a net for Bridget Vines," muttered the tall woman. The other covered her face with her hands, and the veins of her forehead swelled above her fingers; yet when she uncovered her eyes they were red, not with tears, but the effort to suppress their flow.

"It is a long, long time, that I have been here, Ascáshe," answered Bridget, sorrowfully.

"Have you never been out since Samoret left you here?" asked the net-weaver; and she fixed her eyes searchingly upon the face of the girl, who never quailed nor changed color beneath her gaze, but replied in the same tone, "How should little Hope escape—where should she go?" Hope being the name by which Mistress Vines had called her child in moments of tenderness, as suggesting a mother's yearning hope that she would at some time be less capricious, for Bridget had always been a wayward, incoherent, and diminutive creature, and treated with great gentleness by the family.

"Do you remember what I once told you?" continued the other. "You had a friend—you have an enemy."

This time Bridget Vines started, and gave utterance to a long, low, plaintive cry, as if her soul wailed, as it flitted from its frail tenement, for she fell back as if dead upon the skins.

The woman muttered, "The white boy and girl shouldn't have scorned the red woman," and she took her to the verge of the water and awaited her recovery; when she opened her eyes, she continued, "Ascáshe is content—she has been very, very wretched, but so has been her enemy. Look, my hair is black; Wa-ain's is like the white frost."

"I knew it would be so," answered the other, gently, "but it is nothing. Tell me where you have been, Ascáshe, and how came you here? O-ya-ah died the other day." She alluded to an old squaw, who had been her keeper in the cave.

At this moment a shadow darkened the room, another, and another, and three stalwart savages stood before the two women. Each, as he passed, patted the head of Bridget, who shook them off with moody impatience.

They gathered about the coals in the centre, talking in under tones, while the women prepared some venison which was to furnish forth the repast.

That night the men sat long around the fire, and talked of a deadly feud and a deadly prospect of revenge. Ascáshe listened and counseled, and her suggestions were often hailed with intimations of approval—for the woman was possessed of a keen and penetrating mind, heightened by passions at once powerful and malevolent. Had the group observed the white occupant of the skins, they would have seen a pair of dark, bright eyes peering through those snowy locks, and red lips parted, in the eagerness of the intent ear.

"How far distant are they now?" asked the woman.

"A three hours walk down stream," was the answer. "To-morrow they will ascend the falls to surprise our people, and burn the village. To-night, when the moon is down, we are to light a fire at still-water above the falls, and the Terrentines will join us at the signal, leave their canoes in the care of the women, and descend upon our foes. The fire will warn our people how near to approach the falls, for the night will be dark." This was told at intervals, and to the questionings of the woman.

"Where is the Sagamore of Saco," asked Ascáshe.

"John Bonyton heads our foes, but to-night is the last one to the Sagamore."

At this name the white hair stirred violently, and then a low wail escaped from beneath. The group started, and one of the men, with Ascáshe, scanned the face of the girl, who seemed to sleep in perfect unconsciousness; but the panther rolled itself over, stretched out its claws, and threw back his head, showing his long, red tongue, and uttered a yawn so nearly a howl, that the woman declared the sounds must have been the same.

Presently the group disposed themselves to sleep till the moon should set, when they must once more be upon the trail. Previous to this, many were the charges enjoined upon the woman in regard to Bridget.

"Guard her well," said the leader of the band. "In a few suns more she will be a great medicine woman, foretelling things that shall come to the tribes."

We must now visit the encampment of John Bonyton, where he and his followers slept, waiting till the first dawn of day should send them on their deadly path. The moon had set; the night was intensely dark, for clouds flitted over the sky, now and then disburdening themselves with gusts of wind, which swayed the old woods to and fro,[51] while big drops of rain fell amid the leaves and were hushed.

Suddenly a white figure stood over the sleeping chief, so slight, so unearthly in its shroud of wet, white hair, that one might well be pardoned a superstitious tremor. She wrung her hands and wept bitterly as she gazed—then she knelt down and looked more closely; then, with a quick cry, she flung herself into his bosom.

"Oh, John Bonyton, did I not tell you this? Did I not tell you, years ago, that little Hope stood in my path, with hair white as snow?"

The man raised himself up, he gathered the slight figure in his arms—he uncovered a torch and held it to her face.

"Oh, my God! my God!" he cried—and his strength departed, and he was helpless as a child. The years of agony, the lapse of thirty years were concentrated in that fearful moment. Bridget, too, lay motionless and silent, clinging to his neck. Long, long was that hour of suffering to the two. What was life to them! stricken and changed, living and breathing, they only felt that they lived and breathed by the pangs that betrayed the beating pulse. Oh, life! life! thou art a fearful boon, and thy love not the least fearful of thy gifts.

At length Bridget raised herself up, and would have left his arms; but John Bonyton held her fast.

"Nay, Hope, never again. My tender, my beautiful bird, it has fared ill with thee;" and smoothing her white locks, the tears gushed to the eyes of the strong man. Indeed, he, in his full strength and manhood, she, diminutive and bleached by solitude and grief, contrasted so powerfully in his mind, that a paternal tenderness grew upon him, and he kissed her brow reverently, saying,

"How have I searched for thee, my birdie, my child; I have been haunted by the furies, and goaded well nigh to murder—but thou art here—yet not thou. Oh, Hope! Hope!"

The girl listened intent and breathless.

"I knew it would be so, John Bonyton; I knew if parted we could never be the same again—the same cloud returns not to the sky; the same blossom blooms not twice; human faces wear never twice the same look; and, alas! alas! the heart of to-day is not that of to-morrow."

"Say on, Hope—years are annihilated, and we are children again, hoping, loving children."

But the girl only buried her face in his bosom, weeping and sobbing. At this moment a red glare of light shot up into the sky, and Bridget sprung to her feet.

"I had forgotten. Come, John Bonyton, come and see the only work that poor little Hope could do to save thee;" and she darted forward with the eager step which Bonyton so well remembered. As they approached the falls, the light of the burning tree, kindled by the hands of Bridget below the falls, flickered and glared upon the waters; the winds had died away; the stars beamed forth, and nothing mingled with the roar of waters, save an occasional screech of some nocturnal creature prowling for its prey.

Ever and ever poured on the untiring flood, till one wondered it did not pour itself out; and the heart grew oppressed at the vast images crowding into it, swelling and pressing, as did the tumultuous waves over their impediment of granite—water, still water, till the nerves ached from weariness at the perpetual flow, and the mind questioned if the sound itself were not silence, so lonely was the spell—questioned if it were stopped if the heart would not cease to beat, and life become annihilate.

Suddenly the girl stopped with hand pointing to the falls. A black mass gleamed amid the foam—one wild, fearful yell arose, even above the roar of waters, and then the waves flowed on as before.

"Tell me, what is this?" cried John Bonyton, seizing the hand of Bridget, and staying her flight with a strong grasp.

"Ascáshe did not know I could plunge under the falls—she did not know the strength of little Hope, when she heard the name of John Bonyton. She then went on to tell how she had escaped the cave—how she had kindled a signal fire below the falls in advance of that to be kindled above—and how she had dared, alone, the terrors of the forest, and the black night, that she might once more look upon the face of her lover. When she had finished, she threw her arms tenderly around his neck, she pressed her lips to his, and then, with a gentleness unwonted to her nature, would have disengaged herself from his arms.

"Why do you leave me, Hope—where will you go?" asked the Sagamore.

She looked up with a face so pale, so hopeless, so mournfully tender, as was most affecting to behold. "I will go under the falls, and there sleep—oh! so long will I sleep, John Bonyton.

He folded her like a little child to his bosom. "You must not leave me, Hope—do you not love me?"

She answered only by a low wail, that was more affecting than any words; and when the Sagamore pressed her again to his heart, she answered, calling him John Bonyton, as she used to call him in the days of her childhood.

"Little Hope is a terror to herself, John Bonyton. Her heart is all love—all lost in yours; but she is a child, a child just as she was years ago; but you, you are not the same—more beautiful—greater; poor little Hope grows fearful before you;" and again her voice was lost in tears.

The sun now began to tinge the sky with his ruddy hue; the birds filled the woods with an out-gush of melody; the rainbow, as ever, spanned the abyss of waters, while below, drifting in eddies, were fragments of canoes, and still more ghastly fragments telling of the night's destruction. The stratagem of the girl had been entirely successful—deluded by the false beacon, the unhappy savages had drifted on with the tide, unconscious of danger, till the one terrible pang of danger, and the terrible plunge of death came at the one and same moment.

Upon a headland overlooking the falls stood the[52] group of the cavern, stirred with feelings to which words give no utterance, and which find expression only in some deadly act. Ascáshe descended stealthily along the bank, watching intently the group upon the opposite shore, in the midst of which floated the white, abundant locks of Bridget Vines, visible at a great distance. She now stood beside the Sagamore, saying,

"Forget poor little Hope, John Bonyton, or only remember that her life was one long, long thought of thee."

She started—gave one wild look of love and grief at the Sagamore—and then darted down the bank, marking her path with streams of blood, and disappeared under the falls. The aim of the savage had done its work.

"Ascáshe is revenged, John Bonyton," cried a loud voice—and a dozen arrows stopped it in its utterance. Fierce was the pursuit, and desperate the flight of the few surviving foes. The "Sagamore of Saco" never rested day nor night till he and his followers had cut off the last vestige of the Terrantines, and avenged the blood of the unhappy maiden. Then for years did he linger about the falls in the vain hope of seeing once more her wild spectral beauty—but she appeared no more in the flesh; though to this, men not romantic nor visionary declare they have seen a figure, slight and beautiful, clad in robe of skin, with moccasoned feet, and long, white hair, nearly reaching to the ground, hovering sorrowfully around the falls; and this strange figure they believe to be the wraith of the lost Bridget Vines.

It was Goethe, we believe, who objected to some poet, that he put too much water in his ink. This objection would apply to the uncounted host of our amateur versifiers, and poets by the grace of verbiage. If an idea, or part of an idea, chances to stray into the brain of an American gentleman, he quickly apparels it in an old coat from his wardrobe of worn phrases, and rushes off in mad haste to the first magazine or newspaper, in order that the public may enjoy its delectable beauty at once. We have on hand enough MSS. of this kind, which we never intend to print, to freight the navy of Great Britain. But mediocrity and stupidity are not the only sinners in respect to this habit of writing carelessly. Hasty composition is an epidemic among many of our writers, whose powers, if disciplined by study, and directed to a definite object, would enable them to produce beautiful and permanent works. So general is the mental malady to which we have alluded, that it affects the judgments of criticism, and if a collection of lines, going under the name of a poem, contains fine passages, or felicitous flashes of thought, it commonly passes muster as satisfying the requirements of the critical code. Careless writers, therefore, are sustained by indulgent critics, and between both good literature is apt to be strangled in its birth.

Now it is due to Mr. Hirst to say that his poem belongs not to the class we have described. It is no transcript of chance conceptions, expressed in loose language, and recklessly huddled together, without coherence and without artistic form, but a true and consistent creation, with a central principle of vitality and a definite shape. He has, in short, produced an original poem on a classic subject, written in a style of classic grace, sweetness and simplicity, rejecting all superfluous ornament and sentimental prettinesses, and conveying one clear and strong impression throughout all its variety of incident, character and description. It is no conglomeration of parts, but an organic whole. This merit alone should give him a high rank among the leading poets of the country, for it evidences that he has a clear notion of what the word poem means.

We have neither time nor space to analyze the poem, and indicate its merits as a work of art. It displays throughout great force and delicacy of conception, a fine sense of harmony, and a power and decision of expression which neither overloads nor falls short of the thought. In tone it is half way between Shelley and Keats, neither so ideal as the one nor so sensuous as the other. Keat's Endymion is so thick with fancies, and verbal daintinesses, and sweet sensations, that with all its wonderful affluence of beautiful things it lacks unity of impression. The mind of the poet is so possessed by his subject that, in an artistic sense, he becomes its victim, and wanders in metaphor, and revels in separate images, and gets entangled in a throng of thoughts, until, at the end, we have a sense of a beautiful confusion of "flowers of all hues, and weeds of glorious feature," and applaud the fertility at the expense of the force of his mind. The truth is that will is an important element of genius, and without it the spontaneous productions of the mind must lack the highest quality of poetic art. True intellectual creation is an effort of the imagination, not its result, and without force of will to guide it, it does not obey its own laws, and gives little impression of real power. Art is not the prize of luck or the effect of chance, but of conscious combination of vital elements. Mr. Hirst, though he does give evidence of Keats' fluency of fancy and expression, has really produced a finer work of art. We think it is so important that a poem, to be altogether worthy of the name, should be deeply meditated and carefully finished, that we hazard this last opinion at the expense of being berated by all the undeveloped geniuses of the land, as having no true sense of the richness of Keats' mind, or the great capacity implied, rather than fully expressed, in his Endymion.

Mere extracts alone can give no fair impression of the beauty of Mr. Hirst's poem as a whole, but we cannot leave it without quoting a few passages illustrative of the author's power of spiritualizing the voluptuous, and the grace, harmony and expressiveness of his verse:

From the conclusion of the poem we take a few stanzas, describing the struggle of Dian with her passion, when Endymion asserts his love for Chromia:

In conclusion, we cannot but congratulate Mr. Hirst on his success in producing a poem conceived with so much[58] force and refinement of imagination, and finished with such consummate art, as the present. It is a valuable addition to the permanent poetical literature of the country.

This long expected work has at last been published, and we think it will realize the high expectations raised by its announcement two or three years ago. It is mostly composed of extracts from the letters, journals, and unpublished sermons of Dr. Channing, and is edited by his nephew, Wm. H. Channing, who has also supplied a memoir. It conveys a full view of Dr. Channing's interior life from childhood to old age, and apart from its great value and interest, contains, in the exhibition of the steps of his intellectual and spiritual growth, as perfect a specimen of psychological autobiography as we have in literature. Such a work subjects its author to the severest tests which can be applied to a human mind in this life, and we have risen from its perusal with a new idea of the humility, sincerity, and saintliness of Dr. Channing's character. In him self-distrust was admirably blended with a sublime conception of the capacity of man, and a sublime confidence in human nature. He was not an egotist, as passages in his writings may seem to indicate, for he was more severe upon himself than upon others, and numberless remarks in the present volumes show how sharp was the scrutiny to which he subjected the most elusive appearances of pride and vanity. But with his high and living sense of the source and destiny of every human mind, and his almost morbid consciousness of the deformity of moral evil, he reverenced in himself and in others the presence of a spirit which connected humanity with its Maker, and by unfolding the greatness of the spiritual capacities of men, he hoped to elevate them above the degradation of sensuality and sin. He was not a teacher of spiritual pride, conceit and self-worship, but of those vital principles of love and reverence which elevate man only by directing his aspirations to God.

The present volumes give a full length portrait of Dr. Channing in all the relations of life, and some of the minor details regarding his opinions and idiosyncrasies are among the most interesting portions of the book. We are glad to perceive that he early appreciated Wordsworth. The Excursion he eagerly read on its first appearance, and while so many of the Pharisees of taste were scoffing at it, he manfully expressed his sense of its excellence. This poem he recurred to oftener than to any other, and next to Shakspeare, Wordsworth seems to have been the poet he read with the most thoughtful delight. When he went to Europe, in 1822, he had an interview with Wordsworth, and of the impression he himself made on the poet there can be no more pertinent illustration, than the fact that, twenty years afterward, Wordsworth mentioned to an American gentleman that one observation of Channing, respecting the connection of Christianity with progress, had stamped itself ineffaceably upon his mind. Coleridge he appears to have profoundly impressed. In a letter to Washington Allston, Coleridge says of him—"His affection for the good as the good, and his earnestness for the true as the true—with that harmonious subordination of the latter to the former, without encroachment on the absolute worth of either—present in him a character which in my heart's heart I believe to be the very rarest on earth. . . . . Mr. Channing is a philosopher in both the possible renderings of the word. He has the love of wisdom and the wisdom of love. . . . . I am confident that the few differences of opinion between him and myself not only are, but would by him be found to be apparent, not real—the same truth seen in different relations. Perhaps I have been more absorbed in the depth of the mystery of the spiritual life, he more engrossed by the loveliness of its manifestations."

In nothing is Dr. Channing's humility better seen than in his relations to literature. He became an author almost unconsciously. All his intellectual convictions were so indissolubly woven into the texture of his life, so vitalized by his heart and imagination, that writing with him was never an end but a means. Literary fame followed him; he did not follow it. When, however, he found that his reputation not only rung through his own country but was reverberated from Europe, he appears to have feared that it might corrupt his motives for composition. He studiously avoided reading all eulogistic notices of his works or character, though they were interesting to him as indications of the influence his cherished opinions were exerting. The article in the Westminster Review, which exceeded all others in praise, he never read. Dr. Dewey's criticism in the Christian Examiner he only knew as far as related to its objections, and his only disappointment was in finding them so few. Brougham's criticism on his style provoked in him no retort. Hazlitt's coarse attack on him in the Edinburgh Review he considered as an offset to the undue praise he had received from other quarters. "The author of the article," he says, in one of his letters, "is now dead; and as I did not feel a moment's anger toward him during his life, I have no reproach for him now. He was a man of fine powers, and wanted nothing but pure and fixed principles to make him one of the lights of the age."

It would be impossible in our limits to convey an adequate impression of the beauty, value, or interest of the present volumes. They are full of matter. The letters are admirable specimens of epistolary composition, considered as the spontaneous expression of a grave, high and warm nature, to the friends of his heart and mind. They are exceedingly original of their kind, and while they bear no resemblance to those of Cowper, Burns, Byron, or Mackintosh, they are on that very account a positive addition to the literature of epistolary composition. Few biographies have been published within a century calculated to make so deep an impression as this of Dr. Channing, and few could have admitted the reader to so close a communion with the subject, without sacrificing that delicacy in the treatment of frailties due to the character of the departed.

The present work is to some extent an attempt "to head" Mr. Headley. For our part, we profess to have as much patience as any of the descendants of Job, but we must acknowledge that we have broken down in every effort to master the merits of the quarrel between the publishers of the present volumes and the Author of Napoleon and his Marshals. Accordingly we can give no opinion on that matter. In respect to the value of the volumes under consideration, as compared with a similar work by Mr. Headley, there can be little hesitation of judgment. It is idle to say, as some have said, that a work which has run through fifteen editions, as Mr. Headley's has done, is a mere humbug. On the contrary, it is a book evincing a mind as shrewd as it is strong, aiming, it is true, rather at popularity than excellence, but obtaining the former by possessing the sagacity to perceive that accounts of battles, to be generally apprehended, must be addressed to the eye and blood rather than to the understanding; and this power[59] of producing vivid pictures of events Mr. Headley has in large measure. Hence the success of his book, in spite of its exaggerations of statement, sentiment and language.

The present work evinces a merit of another kind. It is a keen, accurate, well-written production, devoid of all tumult in its style and all exaggeration in its matter, and giving close and consistent expositions of the characters, and a clear narrative of the lives, of Napoleon and his Marshals. It is evidently the work of a person who understands military operations, and conveys a large amount of knowledge which we have seen in no other single production on the subject of the wars springing out of the French Revolution. The portraits of fifteen of the marshals, in military costume, are very well executed.

The portion of the work devoted to Napoleon, about one third of the whole, is very able. Its defect consists in the leniency of its judgment on that gigantic public criminal. Napoleon was a grand example of a great man, who demonstrated, on a wide theatre of action, what can be done in this world by a colossal intellect and an iron will without any moral sense. In his disregard of humanity, and his reliance on falsehood and force, he was the architect at once of his fortune and his ruin. No man can be greatly and wisely politic who is incapable of grasping those universal sentiments which underlie all superficial selfishness in mankind, and of discerning the action of the moral laws of the universe. Without this, events cannot be read in their principles. The only defect in Napoleon's mind was a lack of moral insight, the quality of perceiving the moral character and relations of objects, and, wanting this, he must necessarily have been in the long run unsuccessful. It is curious that of all the great men which the Revolution called forth, Lafayette was almost the only one who never violated his conscience, and the only one who came out well in the end. Intellectually he was below a hundred of his contemporaries, but his instinctive sense of right pushed him blindly in the right direction, when all the sagacity and insight of the masters in intrigue and comprehensive falsehood signally failed.

The romantic element in historical events is that which takes the strongest hold upon the imagination and sensibility; and it puts a certain degree of life into the fleshless forms of even the commonplace historian. The incidents of a nation's annals cannot be narrated in a style sufficiently dry and prosaic to prevent the soul of poetry from finding some expression, however short of the truth. It seems to us that there is much error in the common notions regarding matters of fact. Starting from the unquestionable axiom that historians should deal with facts and principles, not with fictions and sentimentalities, most people have illogically concluded that those histories are the worthiest of belief which address the understanding alone, and studiously avoid all the arts of representation. Now this is false in two respects—such histories not only giving imperfect and partial views of facts, but disabling the memory from retaining even them. Facts and events, whether we regard them singly or in their relations, can be perceived and remembered only as they are presented to the whole nature. They must be realized as well as generalized. The sensibility and imagination, as well as the understanding are to be addressed. As far as possible they should be made as real to the mind as any event which experience has stamped on the memory. History thus written, is written close to the truth of things, and conveys real knowledge. Far from departing from facts, or exaggerating them, it is the only kind of history which thoroughly comprehends them. We should never forget that the events which have occurred in the world, are expressions of the nature of man under a variety of circumstances and conditions, and that these events must be interpreted in the light of that common humanity which binds all men together. History, therefore, differs from true poetry, not so much in intensity and fullness of representation; not so much in the force, vividness and distinctness with which things are brought home to the heart and brain, as in difference of object. The historian and the poet are both bound to deal with human nature, but one gives us its actual development, the other its possible; one shows us what man has done, the other what man can do. The annalist who does not enable us to see mankind in real events, is as unnatural as the poetaster who substitutes monstrosities for men in fictitious events.

We accordingly welcome with peculiar heartiness all attempts at realizing history, by evolving its romantic element, and thus demonstrating to the languid and lazy readers of ninepenny nonsense, that the actual heroes and heroines of the world have surpassed in romantic daring the fictitious ones who swell and swagger in most novels and poems. Mr. Gayarre's work is more interesting, both as regards its characters and incidents, than Jane Eyre or James's "last," for, in truth, it requires a mind of large scope to imagine as great things as many men, in every country, have really performed. The History of Louisiana affords a rich field to the poet and romancer, who is content simply to reproduce in their original life some of its actual scenes and characters; and Mr. Gayarre has, to a considerable extent, succeeded in this difficult and delicate task. The work evinces a mind full of the subject; and if defective at all, the defect is rather in style than matter. The author evidently had two temptations to hasty composition—a copious vocabulary and complete familiarity with his subject. There is an occasional impetuosity and recklessness in his manner, and a general habit of tossing off his sentences with an air of disdainful indifference, which characterizes a large class of amateur southern writers. Such a style is often rapid from heedlessness rather than force, and animated from caprice rather than fire. The timid correctness of an elegant diction is not more remote from beauty than the defiant carelessness of a reckless one is from power; and to avoid Mr. Prettyman, it is by no means necessary to "fraternize" with Sir Forcible Feeble. Mr. Gayarre has produced so pleasant a book, and gives evidence of an ability to do so much toward familiarizing American history to the hearts and imaginations of the people, that we trust he will not only give us more books, but subject their style to a more scrupulous examination than he has the present.

The present century has been distinguished above all others in the history of English lexicography, for the number and excellence of its dictionaries. It is a matter of pride to Americans that so far the United States are in advance of England, in regard to the sagacity and labor devoted to the English language. Of those who have done most in this department, the pre-eminence belongs to Dr. Webster and Dr. Worcester. Each has published a Dictionary of great value; and that of the latter is now before us. It bears on every page marks of the most gigantic labor, and must have been the result of many long years of thought and investigation. Its arrangement is admirable, and its definitions clear, concise, critical, and ever to the[60] purpose. The introduction, devoted to the principles of pronunciation, orthography, English Grammar, the origin, formation, and etymology of the English language; and the History of English Lexicography is laden with important information, drawn from a wide variety of sources. Dr. Worcester has also, in the appendix, enlarged and improved Walker's Key to the Classical Pronunciation of Greek, Latin, and Scripture Names, and added the pronunciation of modern geographical names. Taken as a whole, we think the dictionary one which not even the warmest admirers of Dr. Webster can speak of without respect. The advantage which Dr. Worcester's dictionary holds over Dr. Webster's may be compressed in one word—objectiveness. The English language, as a whole, is seen through a more transparent medium in the former than in the latter. Dr. Webster, with all his great merits as a lexicographer, loved to meddle with the language too much. Dr. Worcester is content to take it as it is, without any intrusion of his own idiosyncracies. We think that both dictionaries are honorable to the country, and that each has its peculiar excellencies. Perhaps the student of lexicography could spare neither.

This is a very handsome edition of one of the most wonderful creations of the human intellect, elegantly illustrated with appropriate engravings. It is to a certain extent a family edition, omitting only those portions of the original which would shock the modesty of modern times. We know that there is a great opposition among men of letters to the practice of meddling with a work of genius, and suppressing any portion of it. To a considerable extent we sympathize with this feeling. But when the question lies between a purified edition and the withdrawal of the book from popular circulation, we go for the former. Don Quixote is a pertinent instance. It is not now a book generally read by many classes of people, especially young women, and the younger branches of a family. The reason consists in the coarseness of particular passages and sentences. Strike these out, and there remains a body of humor, pathos, wisdom, humanity, expressed in characters and incidents of engrossing interest, which none can read without benefit and pleasure. The present volume, which might be read by the fireside of any family, is so rich in all the treasures of its author's beautiful and beneficent genius, that we heartily wish it an extensive circulation. It is got up with great care by one who evidently understands Cervantes; and the unity of the work, with all its beautiful episodes, is not broken by the omissions.

This novel is said to be by the author of Jane Eyre, and was eagerly caught at by a famished public, on the strength of the report. It afforded, however, but little nutriment, and has universally disappointed expectation. There is an old saying that those who eat toasted cheese at night will dream of Lucifer. The author of Wuthuring Heights has evidently eat toasted cheese. How a human being could have attempted such a book as the present without committing suicide before he had finished a dozen chapters, is a mystery. It is a compound of vulgar depravity and unnatural horrors, such as we might suppose a person, inspired by a mixture of brandy and gunpowder, might write for the edification of fifth-rate blackguards. Were Mr. Quilp alive we should be inclined to believe that the work had been dictated by him to Lawyer Brass, and published by the interesting sister of that legal gentleman.

This discourse was originally delivered before the Judiciary and Bar of the city and State of New York. In a style of unpretending simplicity it gives a full length portrait of the great chancellor, doing complete justice to his life and works, and avoiding all the vague commendations and meaningless generalities of commonplace eulogy. One charm of the discourse comes from its being the testimony of a surviving friend to the intellectual and moral worth of a great man, without being marred by the exaggeration of personal attachment. Judge Kent's mind and character needed but justice, and could dispense with charity, even when friendship was to indicate the grasp of the one and the excellence of the other.

Mr. Stevens takes a high rank among the leading minds of his denomination. The present work shows that he combines the power of patient research with the ability to express its results in a lucid, animated, and elegant style. His biographies of the Methodist preachers have the interest of a story. Indeed, out of the Catholic Church, there is no religious chivalry whose characters and actions partake so much of heroism, and of that fine enthusiasm which almost loses its own identity in the objects it contemplates, as the Methodist priests.

This is a delightful little story, interesting from its incidents and characters, and conveying excellent morality and humanity in a pleasing dress. The illustrations are those of the London edition, and are admirably graphic. Cruikshank's mode of making a face expressive of character by caricaturing it, is well exhibited in his sketches in the present volume.

The design of this little work is original and commendable. It is written to do good, and we trust may answer the expectations of its author. It enters the bosoms of members of the cabinet, members of congress, bankers, lawyers, editors, &c., and reports the secret meditations of those who affect to be worshipers. It is published by J. W. Moore of this city.

Toilette de Ville.—Dress of Nankin silk, ornamented in the front of the skirt with bias trimming of the same stuff, fastened by silk buttons; corsage plain, with a rounded point, ornamented at the skirt; sleeves half long, with bias trimming; under sleeves of puffed muslin; capote of white crape, ornamented with two plumes falling upon the side.

Sur le Cote.—Dress of blue glacé taffetas, trimmed with two puffs alike, disposed (en tablier;) corsage plain, low in the neck, and trimmed with puffs from the shoulder to the point, and down the side seam; sleeves short, and puffed; stomacher of plaited muslin, (under sleeves of puffed muslin;) cap of lace, lower part puffed, without trimming, ornamented with two long lappets, fastened with some bows of yellow ribbon.

Transcriber's Note:

Small errors in punctuation and obvious printer's errors have been corrected silently. Minor irregularities in spelling have been maintained as in the original.