University of Virginia Library

THE LEGENDARY.

THE CHURCH IN THE WILDERNESS.

BY THE AUTHOR OF HOBOMOK.

BRYANT.

There is a solitary spot, in a remote part of Maine,
known by the name of Indian Old Point. The landscape
has no peculiar beauty, save the little sparkling
river, which winds gracefully and silently among the
verdant hills, as if deeply contented with its sandy bed;
and fields of Indian corn, tossing their silken tresses to

the winds, as if conscious of rural beauty. Yet there
is a charm thrown around this neglected and almost unknown
place, by its association with some interesting
passages in our earliest history. The soil is fertilized
by the blood of a murdered tribe. Even now the
spade strikes against wampum belts, which once
covered hearts as bold and true, as ever beat beneath a
crusader's shield, and gaudy beads are found, which
once ornamented bosoms throbbing with as deep and
fervent tenderness, as woman ever displayed in the
mild courtesies of civilized life.

Here, one hundred years ago, stood the village of the
Norridgewocks, one of the many tribes of the scattered
Abnakis. These Indians have been less celebrated than
many of their brethren; for they had not the fierce valor
of the Pequods, the sinewy strength of the Delawares, or
the bell-toned language of the Iroquois. They were,
however, an influential nation; of consequence on account
of their numbers, as well as their subtilty. The
Jesuits, too, had long been among them, led by their zeal
to fasten the strong girdle of an imposing faith around
the habitable globe; and they had gained over the untutored
minds of these savages, their usual mysterious
and extraordinary power. The long continued state
of effervescence, produced by the Reformation, tended
to settle this country with rigid, restless, and ambitious
spirits. Our broad lands were considered an ample
tract of debatable ground, where the nations of the
earth might struggle for disputed possession; and terrible
indeed was the contest for religious supremacy between
France and England, during the early part of the
eighteenth century. Of the energy and perseverance
displayed in this cause, there are few more striking examples
than Sebastian Rallè, the apostle of the Norridgewocks.
His rude, cross-crowned church, standing

in the heart of the American wilderness, proved
the ambition and extent of that tremendous hierarchy,
`whose roots were in another world, and
whose far stretching shadow awed our own.' Surrounded
by the wigwams of the Abnakis, it seemed like
an apostle of Antioch descended among savages, pointing
out to them the heaven he had left. Our forefathers
indeed thought it wore a different, and most unholy
aspect; but to romantic minds, the Catholic church,
even in its most degraded state, must ever be an object
of interest. The majestic Latin, so lofty in its
sound, and yet so soulless now to all save the learned,
seems like the fragments of a mighty ruin, which Rome,
in her decaying pride, scattered over the nations of the
earth; and the innumerable ceremonies, more voiceless
than the language in which they are preserved, forcibly
remind one of the pomp and power rivalled only by
attendant corruption. In this point of view only could
the humble church of the Norridgewocks kindle the
imagination; for it had little outward proportion, or
inward splendor. It stood in a sheltered spot, between
two small, verdant hills, with one graceful feathery elm
at its side, bending forward, at every signal from the
breeze, and half shading the cross, as if both bowed
down in worship.

Various opinions were formed of the priest, who
there administered the rites of a mysterious religion.
All agreed that he was a learned man; some
said he was benevolent and kind; while others pronounced
him the most subtle and vindictive of hypocrites.
The English settlers, who resided about three
miles from the village of the Abnakis, regarded him
with extreme aversion; but to the Indians he was the
representative of the Good Spirit. It is true the maxims
of the Jesuits had given something of sternness and cunning

to a character naturally mild and frank; but he
verily thought he was doing God's service, and he did
it with a concentration of power and purpose well worthy
of the respect it inspired. For thirty years he lived
in the wilderness, sharing the dangers and privations
incident to savage life. The languages of all the
neighbouring tribes were familiar to him; and his utterance
could not have been distinguished from that of a
native, had it not been for a peculiarly softened cadence,
and rapid enunciation. A restless light in his small,
hazel eye, and the close compression of his lips, betokened
one, who had, with a strong hand, thrown up
dykes against the overflowing torrent of his own mad
passions. The effort had likewise turned back many a
gentle current of affection, which might have soothed
and refreshed his heart; but let man do his worst,
there are moments when nature will rebound from all
the restraints imposed on her by pride, prejudice, or
superstition.

There were two objects in the secluded residence
of the self-denying Jesuit, on whom he poured forth
in fulness the love he could not wholly stifle within
him. When he came to America, he found
among the savages the orphan son of the Baron de
Castine, by a beautiful young Abnakis. The child was
remarkably pretty and engaging; and the lonely priest,
finding his heart daily warming toward him, induced the
squaw who nursed him, to take up her abode in his own
wigwam. The Indians called him Otoolpha, `The Son
of the Stranger,' and seemed to regard the adopted
one with quite as much interest as their own offspring.
Not a year after Otoolpha and his nurse were domesticated
in the dwelling of the Jesuit, some of the tribe,
on their return from Canada, found a nearly famished
female infant in the wood. Had not Sebastian Rallè

been of the party, its sufferings would, probably, have
met a violent end; but at his suggestion, comfortable
nourishment, and such care as they could give it were
afforded. A nose slightly approaching to aquiline, and
a complexion less darkly colored than usual, betrayed
an origin half European; but as her parentage and
tribe were unknown, they gave her the emphatic name
of Saupoolah, `The Scattered Leaf,' and engrafted her
on the tree of Abnakis. From the first dawn of reason
she gave indications of an impetuous, fearless, and romantic
spirit. The squaw who nursed her, together
with the little Otoolpha, tried in vain to curb her roving
propensities. At four and five years old, she would
frequently be absent several days, accompanied by her
foster brother. The duties of the missionary often
called him far from home, and it was absolutely impossible
for him always to watch over them, either in kindness,
or authority. Their long excursions during his
absence, at first occasioned many anxious and wretched
thoughts; but when he found his wayward protégés invariably
returned, and when he saw they could cross
streams, leap ditches, and thread their way through
the labyrinths of the wilderness, with the boldness and
sagacity of young hunters, he ceased to disturb himself
on their account.

During the whole of their adventurous childhood but
one accident ever happened to them. They had been
at the English settlement to beg some beads in exchange
for their little baskets, and on their return, they
took a fancy to cross the Kennebec, when recent rains
had swollen its deep and beautiful waters. Saupoolah's
life nearly fell a sacrifice to the rapidity of the current;
but her foster brother ran, with the speed of lightning, to
call assistance from the village they had just left. A
muscular, kind hearted woman, by the name of Allan,

lived in a log-house, very near the river. In the midst
of his terror, Otoolpha remembered this circumstance,
and went there for succor. His frightened looks told
his story, even more plainly than his hurried exclamation;—`Ogh!
Saupoolah die'—the Great Spirit drink
her up!' Mrs Allan saved the Indian child at the
risk of her own life, dried her clothes, gave them something
warm and comfortable to eat, and conducted them
into their homeward path in safety. To this woman
and her children Otoolpha and Saupoolah ever after
clung with singular intensity of affection. During their
childish summers, it was a daily occupation to fill baskets
with berries for her little ones, whom they always
chose to feed with their own hands, watching every
morsel of the fruit as it disappeared between their rosy
lips, with the most animated expressions of delight; and
when they arrived at maturer years, they used the great
influence they had with the tribe, to protect Mrs Allan
from a thousand petty wrongs and insults, with which
her white brethren were not unfrequently visited.

Educated by the learned priest, as far as such fetterless
souls could be educated, and associating only with
savages, these extraordinary young people grew up
with a strange mixture of European and aboriginal
character. Both had the rapid, elastic tread of Indians;
but the outlines of their tall, erect figures possessed
something of the pliant gracefulness of France. When
indignant, the expression of their eyes was like light
from a burning-glass; but in softer moments, they had
a melting glance, which belongs only to a civilized and
voluptuous land. Saupoolah's hair, though remarkably
soft and fine, had the jet black hue of the savage;
Otoolpha's was brown, and when moistened by exercise,
it sometimes curled slightly around his high, prominent
forehead. The same mixture of nations was shown in

their costume, as in their personal appearance. Otoolpha
usually wore a brown cloth tunic, with tight sleeves,
and large buttons, under which appeared a scarlet kilt
falling to his knees, in heavy folds, edged with the fur
of the silver fox, and fastened at the waist by a broad
girdle, richly ornamented with Indian hieroglyphics.
A coronet of scarlet dyed fur, to which were fastened
four silver bells, gave indication of his noble descent;
and from his neck were suspended a cross and rosary
of sandal wood, which Sebastian Rallè declared to have
been sanctified by the blessed touch of Innocent the
Eleventh. Saupoolah's dress was nearly similar. Her
tunic was deep yellow; and her scarlet kilt touched the
fur edge of her high, closely fitted, and very gaudy
moccasins. Her cap was not shaped unlike a bishop's
mitre; gaily ornamented with shells and beadwork,
and surmounted by the black feathers of three eagles her
own arrow had slain. In the chase, she was as eager
and keen eyed as Otoolpha. It was a noble sight to
see them, equipped for the chase, bounding along
through the forest. The healthful and rapid blood,
coursing beneath their smooth, brown cheeks, gave a
richness and vividness of beauty, which a fair, transparent
complexion can never boast; and their motions had
that graceful elasticity produced only by activity, unconsciousness,
and freedom. Sebastian Rallè had been several
years at Rome, in the service of the Pope, and had
there acquired a refinement of taste uncommon at that
early period. His adopted children sometimes accompanied
him on his missionary expeditions to Canada and
elsewhere, on which occasions the game they killed
served for his support. When he saw them with their
dark eyes fixed on a distant bird, arrows ready for flight,
their majestic figures slightly bending backward, resting
on one knee, with an advancing foot firmly fixed on
the ground, displaying, by a natural bend of the limb,
outlines most gracefully curved, he gazed upon them
with uncontrolled delight; and he could not but acknowledge
that the young savages, in their wild and
careless beauty, rivalled the Apollos and woodnymphs
to which classic imaginations had given birth. Such
endowments are rare in Indian women; for the toils
imposed upon them, usually weigh down the springs of
the soul, till the body refuses to rebound at its feeble
impulses; but when it does occur, it is the very
perfection of ideal loveliness. Otoolpha would suffer
no one to curb Saupoolah in her wildness and inspiration.
To him and the Jesuit, she was docile and affectionate;
to all others, haughty and impetuous. The
Norridgewocks regarded them both with wonder and
superstition, and frequently called them by a name,
which signified the `Children of the Prophet.' The distant
tribes, who frequently met them in their hunting
excursions, were lost in admiration of their swiftness and
majesty, and called them, by one consent, the `Twin
Eagles of Abnakis.'

Contemptuously as some think of our red brethren,
genius was no rare endowment among them; and seldom
have souls been so rich in the wealth of nature, as
the two powerful and peculiar beings, whom we have
described. Many were the bold and beautiful thoughts
which rushed upon their untutored imaginations, as they
roamed over a picturesque country, sleeping in clefts
where panthers hid themselves, and scaling precipices
from which they scared the screaming eagles. Perhaps
cultivated intellect never received brighter thoughts from
the holy rays of the evening star, or a stormier sense of
grandeur from the cataract, than did these children of
the wilderness. Their far leaping ideas, clothed in brief,
poetic language, were perhaps more pleasant to the secluded

priest, than frequent intercourse with his own
learned, but crafty order. To him they were indeed
as `diamonds in the desert;' and long and painful were
the penances he inflicted upon himself, for an all-absorbing
love, which his erring conscience deemed a sin
against that God, who bestowed such pure, delicious feelings
on his mysterious creatures. The Jesuit was deeply
read in human nature, and it needed but little sagacity
to foresee that Saupoolah would soon be to her brother
`something than sister dearer.' When Otoolpha was
but seventeen, and his companion not quite fifteen,
their frank and childish affection had obviously assumed
a different character. Restlessness when separated,
and timidity and constraint when they met, betrayed
their slavery to a new and despotic power. Sebastian
Rallè observed it with joy. Early disappointment and
voluntary vows had made the best and most luxurious
emotions of our nature a sealed fountain within his own
soul; but the old man had not forgotten youthful hopes
and feelings, and for these beloved ones he coveted all
earth had of happiness. They were married in presence
of the whole tribe, with all the pomp and ceremony
his limited means afforded. This event made no alteration
in the household of the Jesuit. The old squaw,
who had taken care of his adopted children from their
infancy, performed all the services their half civilized
way of life required, and the young hunters led the
same wandering and fearless life as before. At the hour
of sunset, it was the delight of the lonely priest to
watch for their return, from a small opening, which
served as a window to his study. It was a time he usually
devoted to reflection and prayer; but the good man
had virtues, which he called weaknesses and sins, and
a spirit of devotion would not always remain with him
at such seasons. The vine covered hills of France, his
mother's kiss, and a bright, laughing girl, who had won
his heart in early youth, would often rise before him
with the distinctness of visions. The neglected rosary
would fall from his hand, and love, as it first stole over a
soul untainted by sensuality or selfishness, was the
only heaven of which he dreamed. Such were the
feelings with which he awaited the return of Otoolpha
and Saupoolah, on the eleventh of December, 1719.
Notwithstanding the lateness of the season, the day had
been as mild as the first weeks of September. The
drowsy sunshine dreaming on the hemlocks, pines, and
cedars, had drawn forth an unusual fragrance; the
children were at rest in the wigwams; most of the sanups
had gone to Moose Head Lake, on a hunting expedition;
and the few old men who remained, sat at the
doors of their huts smoking their pipes in lazy silence.

Wautoconomese, an aged prophet among them, declared
this unnatural warmth to be a prelude of terrible
things. He had gained his power of judging by a close
observation of electrical phenomena and all the various
changes of the weather, and it was no difficult matter
to make his tribe mistake experience for inspiration.
The women were all in alarm at his predictions; nor is
it strange that the learned Jesuit, living as he did in a
superstitious age, and believing doctrines highly calculated
to excite the imagination, should be more affected
by their terrors than he was willing to acknowledge,
even to himself. These feelings naturally embodied
themselves in anxiety concerning the two eccentric beings,
whose presence was as morning sunshine in his
dreary dwelling. The hour at which they usually returned,
had long since passed; and strong and vigilant
as he knew them to be, fearful thoughts of panthers and
wolves crowded on his heart. Waking, he knew the
fiercest prowlers of the wilderness would have shunned

them; but they might have slept where loup-cerviers
were in ambush, and roused too late for safety.

While philosophy was struggling with these harassing
ideas, and every moment growing weaker in the
contest, he observed in the north a flash more brilliant
than ever precedes the rising sun. For a moment it
was stationary; then it moved, quivered, hurtled, and
flashed, as if there had been `war in heaven,' and the
clouds, rolling themselves up `as a scroll,' showed the
gleaming of javelins, thrown thick and fast along the
embattled line. All at once, a vivid stream of light
from the south towered up, like Lucifer in his terrific
greatness, and rushed onward with a mighty noise. The
fiery forces, nearly meeting at the zenith, were separated
only by a clear, deep spot of blue, surrounded by a
few fleecy clouds. The effect was awful. It seemed
as if the All-seeing Eye were looking down upon a sinful
world, in mingled wrath and pity. The Catholic
bowed his head, and his subdued spirit was mute in
worship and fear. His solitude was soon interrupted by
Wautoconomese, whose trembling agitation betrayed
how little he had foreseen that his pompous prophecies
would be thus sublimely fulfilled. Next the aged squaw,
who, from fear of interrupting her master in his devotions,
had long been crouching in her own corner of the
wigwam, more dead than alive, came in, and reverentially
crossing herself, implored permission to remain.
To these were soon added an accession of almost all the
women in the hamlet. Perhaps Sebastian Rallè was
hardly aware how much the presence of these rude, uninformed
beings relieved his spirit. His explanations
to them, mixed with the consolations of religion, nerved
his mind with new strength; and he began to look upon
the awful appearance in the heavens with a calmness
and rationality worthy of him. By degrees the light

grew dim, then closed upon the speck of blue sky, which
had appeared to keep watch over the souls of superstitious
men, and the glorious scene seemed about to end.
But suddenly a luminous bow shot from north to south
with the rushing sound of a rocket, and divided the
heavens with a broad belt of brightness. The phenomena
of that night had been more extraordinary than any
the Jesuit had ever witnessed; but until that moment
he had known their name and nature; and, with that
strange tendency to a belief in supernatural agency,
which the greatest and wisest minds have, in a state of
high excitement, his cheek now turned pale, and his
heart dropped heavily within him, at what he deemed a
sure presage of ruin to those he loved. Reason would
have indeed told him that it did not comport with the
economy of Providence to change the order of creation
for so insignificant a thing as man; but who is not more
under the influence of feeling than of reason?

Unable to endure the terrific creations of his own fancy,
he left the house, followed only by one of the tribe, and
entered the path by which the young hunters usually returned.
He pursued this route, for nearly a mile, without
seeing any traces of the objects of his anxiety. At
last, he heard a loud `Willoa.' The source of the clear,
ringing sound could not be mistaken; for Saupoolah alone
could give the shrillest tones of the human voice such
depth and smoothness of melody. The Jesuit, by his
long residence with the savages, had acquired their
quickness of eye and ear, and a few moments brought
him within view of his adopted child. She was standing
in a thickly shaded part of the wood, her hand resting on
her brow, looking backward, apparently listening with
eagerness to the coming footsteps. A slight shade of disappointment
passed over her face when she saw Otoolpha
was not with her father; but it soon gave place to

an affectionate smile, at his enthusiastic demonstrations
of joy. From her brief account it appeared they had
early in the evening heard distressed noises apparently
proceeding from a human voice; that they had separated
in search of those from whom it came, and had
thus lost each other. As she finished her story, another
loud shout sent echoing through the forest, betrayed
more anxiety than was common to her fearless nature.
Yet even amid her doubt and perplexity, her romantic
soul was open to the influence of the sublime scene
above her. As they wound along through the forest,
ever and anon shouting with their united voices, in hopes
the echo would arouse Otoolpha, she occasionally fixed
her eye on the bright arch, which still preserved its wavy
radiance, though a little softened by light flashes of
clouds, through which the stars were distinctly visible.
`The arrows have been flying fast among the tribes of
heaven to night,' said she. `The stars have chased their
enemies over the hills. They are returning victorious;
and the moon has spread her mantle in their war path.'

When such thoughts as these came over her, Saupoolah's
eyes had a brightness totally different from the
keenness and outward brilliancy common to fine looking
Indians; it was a light that came from within, gleaming
up from fires deep, deep down in the soul. It was
probably this peculiarity, which had so universally gained
for her the title of `Daughter of a Prophet;' and its
effect on the savage, who had attended the Jesuit, was
instantly observable; for he devoutly crossed himself,
and walked at a great distance from the object of his
veneration. Sebastian Rallè, accustomed as he was to
the wild freaks, and almost infantile tenderness of his
adopted children, had often smiled at their power over
the tribe; yet something of pride, almost of deference,
mingled with his own love of them. Saupoolah's remark,

and the look of inspiration, with which she fixed her
eye on the heavens, awakened in his mind the remembrance
of many a season, when he had listened to their
wild eloquence with wonder and delight. This train of
thought betrayed itself in an eagerly affectionate glance
at Saupoolah, and a loud shout to Otoolpha, that made
the woods ring again. The young wife suddenly assumed
the Indian attitude of intense listening; and joy
flushed her whole face, like a sunbeam, as she exclaimed,
`It is answered!' Another shout! there could be no
mistake. It could not be the reverberation of an echo,
for it was repeated louder and louder, at irregular intervals.
A rapid and devious walk, guided by sounds
which evidently grew nearer, brought Otoolpha in sight.
Quick as a young fawn, overflowing with life and frolic,
Saupoolah bounded forward, and sprang upon his neck.
But the eye of the Jesuit, always rapid and restless in
its movements, quickly glanced from his new found
treasure to the objects around. A European lady,
possessed of much matronly beauty, lay lifeless at his
feet; and a fragile looking boy, apparently eight or nine
years old, was bending over her, and weeping bitterly.
This child, alone in the wilderness with his dead mother,
had uttered those cries of distress and terror, which
had startled Otoolpha and his companion. The sight
of a white man seemed to the desolate boy a pledge of
safety. He nestled close to the side of the priest, and
looking up in his face imploringly, burst into tears.
The heart of the Jesuit was touched. There was something
in the boy's voice and the lady's features, that
troubled the waters of a long sealed fountain. The Indians
exchanged whispers with that air of solemnity,
which the presence of the dead always inspires. They
read a mixed feeling of agony and doubt in the countenance
of Sebastian Rallè, but they did not ask, and
they never knew its origin. After a moment's silence,
during which he seemed struggling with powerful emotion,
he placed his hand gently on the boy's head, and
spoke soothing words in French, which the child understood
with perfect facility. No sigh, no outward sign of
despair escaped him; but there was a marble stillness,
which, like the ominous quiet of a volcano, betrayed
that raging materials were at work within.

He ordered the corpse to be borne to his wigwam
with all possible gentleness; and when the unevenness
of the path occasioned the least violence of motion, he
would cringe, as if an adder had stung him. It was in
vain that Wautoconomese and his frightened companion
sought protection from him, on his return. Remarkable
electrical appearances, in every variety of form, continued
during the whole night; but the miserable man
regarded them not. The lifeless mother was placed in
his study, and he knelt down beside it with the boy, and
spoke not a word. The old squaw brought in her tallest
bayberry wax candles, and tried to prolong her stay in
the room by a thousand little officious arts; but a gentle
signal to withdraw was all she could gain from her
heart stricken master. Day dawned, and found him
unchanged in countenance or position. The boy, weary
with grief and fatigue, had fallen asleep, and lay on the
floor in a slumber as deep and peaceful as if unalloyed
happiness had been his portion. The sight of his tranquil
innocence, as the daylight shone upon his childish
features, brought tears to the eyes of the rigid priest.
It was a charm that broke the spell of agony which had
bound down his spirit. The terribly cold and glassy
look departed from him; but never, after that night,
was Sebastian Rallè as he had been. Affliction did not
soften and subdue him. It deepened the gloom with
which he had long looked upon the world, and seemed

to justify him in giving up his whole soul to the stern
dictates of Jesuitical maxims. Even Otoolpha and
Saupoolah met with occasional harshness; and William
Ponsonby, the English boy, alone received uniform
mildness and affection at his hands. He was a fair and
delicate blossom; such a being as the heart would
naturally cling to for its very fragility and dependence;
but to none on earth, save Sebastian Rallè, was it
known that there were other and deeper reasons for his
peculiar tenderness.

The lady, whom he had loved in early youth, had been
induced by her parents to marry a wealthy Englishman,
in preference to the unportioned Frenchman, whom
alone she had truly loved. Her husband lost much of
his fortune, and joined his countrymen against the
French, during the troubled period between 1690 and
1762. He was taken by the Indians, and his wife
saw him suffer a horrid and lingering death. By the
humanity of one of the savages, she made her escape,
with her youngest son, the only one remaining of eight
fine boys. She well knew the residence of that devoted
lover, whom her weakness of purpose had driven to a
life of solitude and self-denial; and to him she resolved
to appeal for protection. Worn out with wandering and
privation, she died suddenly in the wilderness, when
her arduous journey was well nigh completed; and the
conscientious priest, even in the anguish of a breaking
heart, felt that it was well for him she had died; for to
have seen the widowed one depending upon him for
protection, when the solemn vows of his order had
separated them forever, would have been worse than
death to endure. The affection he had borne the
mother rested on the child; and in him he found, what
he had in vain wished for since his residence in the
New World, a docile and intelligent scholar.

The boy was indeed a sort of `young Edwin;' a sad,
imaginative child, fond of his books, and still more fond
of rambling far and wide with the wayward Saupoolah.
The log-house of good Mrs Allan was the only place
where William spoke in the language of his father; for
English was a hateful sound to the ear of the Jesuit.
The troubles between the neighbouring villages of
English and Abnakis increased daily; and not a few of
the latter were induced to revolt against their spiritual
ruler. Distrust, jealousy, and weakness characterized
all their councils. Their deep, but fluctuating feelings
alternately showed themselves in insults to the priest,
and acts of violence on their neighbours. Representatives
were sent from the English villages on the Kennebec
to the government at Boston, who protested against
Sebastian Rallè, for constantly using his influence to
excite Indian revenge to its utmost rancor; and letters
filled with charges of this nature may still be seen in
the records of the Historical Society. It is probable
that they were, in some measure, well founded; for it
was the dangerous creed of the Jesuits, that all human
power, good or bad, should be made subservient to
one grand end. Yet the Norridgewocks had so much
reason to complain of the fraud and falsehood of the
English, that it is difficult to decide to whom the
greatest share of blame rightfully belongs. Be that as
it may, affairs went from bad to worse. Mutual dislike
became every day more inveterate; and Mrs Allan
was the only one who had not in some way or other
suffered from the powerful arm of the implacable
Otoolpha. His French origin, the great influence he
had over his tribe, and his entire submission to the will
of the Jesuit, procured for him a double portion of
hatred. Dislike was returned with all the fierceness
and impetuosity of his savage nature; and English

mothers often frightened their children into obedience
by the use of his terrible name. In the autumn of
1724, these discontents were obviously approaching
a fearful crisis. A Council Fire was kindled at the
village of the Abnakis; and fierce indeed were the
imprecations uttered, and terrible the resolutions taken
against the English.

Wautoconomese in his fury said, that the Evil Spirit
had governed them ever since William Ponsonby came
among them; and he demanded that the boy should at
once be sacrificed to an offended Deity. The lip of the
venerable priest quivered and turned pale for an instant;
but it passed quickly, and so carefully had even the
muscles of his face been trained in obedience to the
Society of Jesus, that rigid indifference could alone be
read there, as he carelessly asked, `Wherefore should
the child die?' The fierce old prophet watched his
emotions as the snake fixes her infernal eye on the bird
she is charming unto death. `Because the Great Spirit,
who dwells among the windy hills, and covers himself
with the snow mantle, has whispered it in the ear of
the wise man,' said he proudly. `Wherefore else did
he breathe softly on the wood, for four sleeps, and take
his garments from the sun, that it might give warmth to
the pale papoose, on his way through the wilderness?
I tell you, he sent him to Wautoconomese, that he
might sacrifice him instead of the young fawn and the
beaver; for he loves not the white face and the double
tongue of the Yengees.'

`And the love I bear them is such as the panther
gives the stricken deer,' replied the Jesuit. `Ye are
all one! ye are all one!' answered the raging prophet.
`The Yengees say their king has counted more scalps
than any other chief; and you say he is but a boy to
the great king, who lives where the vines run with oil.

Ye both have faces pale as a sick woman. One hisses
like a snake, and the other chatters like a mad cat bird;
but both hunt the poor Indian like a buffalo to his trap.
Wautoconomese was once a very big prophet. The
Great Spirit spoke to him loud, and his tribe opened
their eyes wide, that they might look on him. What is
Wautoconomese now? He speaks the words of the
Great Spirit; and ye laugh when ye tell the young men
of his tribe that his ears are old, and he cannot hear.'

His stormy eloquence awakened the slumbering pride
of his warlike nation; and against the whole race of white
men they inwardly breathed a vow of extermination.

The boy was bound for sacrifice, and evil eyes were
cast upon the Jesuit. The ingratitude of those for
whom he had toiled thirty long years, and the threatened
loss of the dearest object which God had left to cheer
his lonely pilgrimage, seemed to freeze the faculties of
the old man; and that day would have ended his trials
with his life, had not Otoolpha stepped into the centre
of the Council Circle, and, with a low bow to Wautoconomese,
demanded to be heard. He spoke reverently
of the prophet; but, by all the sufferings and kindness
of their French Father, he conjured them not to be
ungrateful to him in his old age. He begged for the
boy's life, and promised to lead his tribe to war against
every white man, woman, and child, from Corratwick
Falls to the Big Sea, if they would thus reward his
victory.

He was a favorite with his tribe, and they listened
to him. After much consultation, they determined on
midnight marches at the end of three weeks, by which
means they intended to surprise and put to death all the
English settlers on the Kennebec. If successful in this
attempt, William Ponsonby was safe; if not, the innocent
child must fall a victim to their savage hatred.

Saupoolah slept little the night after she listened to
the Council of her tribe. She thought of Mrs Allan's
kind looks, when she saved her from drowning; and
she remembered the happy hours when she used to feed
the children from her little berry basket. Could she not
save her from the general ruin? She asked Otoolpha
if no stratagem could be devised. He told her it would
lead to detection, and the life of William and the priest
would be forfeited. In her uneasy slumbers she dreamed
of the murder of her benefactress; and she started up,
declaring she would save Mrs Allan's life at the peril
of her own. Otoolpha resolutely and somewhat harshly
forbade her to do it. It was the first time he had ever
spoken to her in a tone of authority; and her proud
spirit rose against him. `I have loved him,' thought
she, `but not with the tameness of a household drudge;
if such is the service he wants, let him leave Saupoolah,
and find a mate among the slaves of Abnakis.' Her
manner the next day was cold, suspicious, and constrained
towards her husband. She said no more to
him of her plans, but sought advice from the priest.
The heart broken old man was roused into sudden energy,
and solemnly and vehemently forbade her project.
Saupoolah's soul struggled in cords to which she had
been entirely unaccustomed. She was silent, but determined.
That night she left Otoolpha in a sound sleep,
and effected her dangerous purpose secretly. She told
Mrs Allan all the plans of the Norridgewocks, beseeching
her to make no other use of the knowledge,
than to save herself and family. The terrified matron
promised she would not. But could, or ought, such a
promise to be kept?

Time passed on, and threw no light on the dangerous
deed Saupoolah had dared to perform. Fears of its

consequences haunted her own soul, like a restless
demon; and again and again did she extort from Mrs
Allan a vow never to betray her. More than half of
her fault sprang from a kind and generous nature; but
she could not forgive herself for the vexation that had
mingled with better feelings. Her pride and her buoyancy
were both gone; and upon Otoolpha, Sebastian
Rallè, and William Ponsonby, she lavished the most
anxious fondness.

The old priest cared little whether life or death were
his portion; for he was old, and disappointment had
ever been the shadow of his hopes. But for the dead
mother's sake, his heart yearned for the life of the
boy. Saupoolah, ever enthusiastic and self-sacrificing,
promised to convey him away secretly, and place him
under the protection of a Canadian priest. The time
appointed was four days before the intended massacre
of the English, when a Council Fire of one of the
neighbouring tribes would induce most of the Norridgewocks
to be absent. The night preceding his departure
was a weary one to Sebastian Rallè. He spent it at
William's couch in wakefulness and prayer. Affections,
naturally intense, were all centered on this one object;
and he had nerved himself to think that he must part
with him, and then lay him down and die.

The gray tints of morning rose upon him, showing
the whole of his miserable little apartment in cheerless
obscurity. The old priest, stern, philosophic, and rigid
elsewhere, was in the seclusion of his own apartment,
as wayward and affectionate as a child. He stooped
down, and parting William's soft hair, imprinted a kiss
on his forehead. The boy, half unconscious what he did,
fondly nestled his cheek into the hand that rested on him.
Sebastian Rallè looked upward with an expression that
seemed to say, `O Father, would that this cup might

pass from me.' Just then the church bell, with feeble
but sweet tones, announced the hour of early mass.
William was on his feet in an instant, and as quickly
knelt to his venerable friend to receive his customary
benediction. In a few minutes, every living soul in the
hamlet was within the walls of the church. Wigwams
were all quiet, and canoes were wimpling about in Sandy
river. The savages had all bowed down and crossed
themselves before the unseen God. The broken voice
of the Jesuit was heard loudly beseeching, `Ora, ora
pro nobis,' when armed men rushed in amid their peaceful
worship. The clashing of swords, the groans of the
dying, and the yells of the frantic, mingled in one horrid
chaos of clamor. Not one escaped; not one. Some
called out, `Save William Ponsonby and the priest!'
Others aimed at the breast of the Jesuit, as if he had
been the only victim desired. The English boy threw
himself forward and received a stab, aimed at the heart
of his old friend; and the priest, with one convulsive
bound, and one loud shriek of agony, withdrew the
sword and plunged it deeply in his own breast.

Saupoolah's noble heart broke with intensity of suffering.
She fell lifeless by the side of the murdered
William, and a dozen swords at once were pointed at
her. Otoolpha cast one hurried glance upon her; and
man has no power to speak the mingled rage, despair,
and anguish, which that wild glance expressed. With
the concentrated strength of fifty savages, he forced his
way unhurt to the river side, and sprung into Saupoolah's
favorite canoe. The boat filled with water; and
he found that even here the treacherous revenge of his
enemies would reach his life. With desperate strength
he gained the shore, and ran toward the forest. His
coronet and belt made him a conspicuous victim; multitudes
were in pursuit; and he died covered with

wounds. * * * Before the setting of the sun, the pretty
hamlet was reduced to ashes; and the Indians slept
their last sleep beneath their own possessions. * * * For
many years two white crosses marked the place where
the Jesuit and his English boy were buried; but they
have long since been removed. The white man's corn is
nourished by the bones of the Abnakis; and the name
of their tribe is well nigh forgotten.

THE VALLEY OF SILENCE.

BY WILLIAM CUTTER.

KATAHDIN.

THE WEDDING.

At the little village of Stanton-Drew, in Somersetshire,
and not far from the splendid city of Bath, there
is a large circle of upright stones, each of which is from
five to six feet high. The learned are of opinion that it
is a Druidical monument or temple, and they are countenanced
by the name of the village; but the rustics
call it `The Wedding;' for tradition asserts that it is a
bridal party, changed to stone. And I would give my
humble voice on the side of the rustics and tradition.
The story is as follows.

There lived in this place, I cannot say precisely
when, but many hundred years ago, a peasant girl by
the name of Emma. She was the beauty of the village.
Nature had lavished her gifts with such profusion on
this lovely cottager, that it was impossible for the meanness
of her attire, or the humility of her employments
to conceal her from general notice and admiration—they
could not hide the perfect symmetry of her form, nor the
dazzling whiteness of her skin, nor the sparkling of her
full black eyes. The carnation hue of health was on
her cheeks, her step fell as light as the first snow of the
year on the Mendip hills, and her heart was as free and
as simple as childhood's.

A youth of the same village first taught that heart the
mystic lore of love. He was not unworthy of the feelings
which he inspired. Edred as far surpassed the
other youth of the neighbourhood as Emma did the
maidens. In manly sports and exercises he bore away
the prize of every competition, and the land which he
tilled was the most productive of any for miles around.
He was generous, open-hearted, and affectionate, and
though fearless, he was gentle and kind. Beside all
this, his desire of knowledge had led him to seek the
acquaintance and instruction of the members of a neighbouring
monastery, who encouraged his wishes, and
taught him to read and write—accomplishments, which
in those days were extremely rare, even among those
who were much higher born than Edred. In the ardor
of youth, and with the most lively sensibilities, it is not
to be supposed that he alone should remain insensible
to those charms which led captive every other heart—
and as to Emma, she had too much discernment not to
perceive his superior worth, and prefer him before all
his rivals. Living near each other as they did, their
opportunities of meeting were frequent, and they were
improved. Preference ripened into love, and as they
sat together one sweet moonlight evening under an old
elm tree, which stood between the gardens of their parents,
Edred poured out his vows at her feet, and Emma
took Heaven to witness that she loved him alone, and
loved him with her whole heart. From this moment
they were hardly ever asunder. Day after day found
them assisting each other in their daily labour, and
night after night have the pale moonbeams, as they
danced through the boughs of that old elm tree, been
the only witnesses of their innocent and happy interviews.
It was soon known throughout the village that
their mutual faith was plighted. Their parents, far

from being averse to the union, were overjoyed at it;
as to both parties it was a most desirable one, and it
was settled between them that the marriage day should
not be distant. But it would seem as if such happiness
was too great to be durable, for the blighting of all this
promise was at hand.

A rich baron came to live in the neighbourhood. He
saw Emma, and was enamoured. She perceived it, and
avoided him. He was not however to be so discouraged;
but, finding it impossible to obtain a hearing from the
maid, he applied to her parents. He told them of his
rank, his riches, his lands; protested that his views
were honorable; and painted in glowing colors the advantages
which would arise to them from their daughter's
becoming the mistress of all his wealth and splendor.
What could the simple people do? They were
dazzled, they were overcome, and promised this titled
suitor that they would use all their influence with their
daughter in advancing his cause. They did so; they
beset the poor girl, night and day; the mother intreated
and wept, and the father commanded and frowned;
and a sister too, whom she dearly loved, hung upon her
neck, and kissed her, and clasped on her arms and
braided in her hair the rich jewels which the baron had
sent her, and begged her to be a baron's bride. Wearied,
terrified, and melted by importunity, menace, and
tears, and tempted too, it must be acknowledged, by the
prospect of such an alliance as was held out to her, she
at last consented to receive the baron as a lover—consented
that all her engagements with Edred should be
dissolved—consented to break her oaths, her vows, her
faith, and Edred's heart.

But where was Edred all this while? If he had been
in the village, indeed, he might have saved his mistress
from the guilt, and himself from the misery, of such a

change. But necessity had called him to a distant part
of the country, and he returned unconscious of all that
had taken place in his absence, and unprepared for the
storm that awaited his coming. He was not long kept
in ignorance, for the story was in the mouth of every
stripling in the village; and his eager eye had just
caught a glimpse of the blue smoke which curled above
the trees, and pointed out Emma's dwelling, when from
a shepherd boy who was tending his flock on the hills,
he heard it all. In a state little short of distraction, he
flew to the door which always used to be thrown open
before he reached it—and it was now shut against him
—he was told that the great man was there, and that he
must not come in. He heard no more, but swooned on
the threshold, and was borne away senseless to the cottage
of his parents.

As Emma, ignorant of Edred's return, was sitting on
the following night at her window, after every one
beside had gone to rest—for, torn by a thousand conflicting
thoughts, she slept but little now—she saw something
approaching the cottage, and shortly after heard a
noise at the door. Trembling with an emotion for
which she knew not how to account, she went down and
opened it. The visitor was Edred's favorite dog, who
dropt a packet at her feet, and, without waiting, as usual,
to be caressed, disappeared. His master was then
in the village—it could not be doubted—for the same
faithful messenger had often been employed in happier
days, to convey the letters which her first lover had
taught her to read. Though ready to sink on the floor,
she summoned all her strength, and sustained herself to
her chamber, where, breaking the string which bound
the packet, she read the following lines.

`I thought you loved me, Emma—fondly thought you
loved me—it was a dear delusion, but it is over now—a

heavenly dream, but it has fled forever, and left me to the
reality of wretchedness and despair. Would I could
sleep again, and never waken! Is all that has past between
us forgotten then? our blissful interviews, our
plighted faith, our vowed affections, are they all forgotten?
It is not, sure, so long since we parted, that every
endearing recollection should thus have passed away.
Why, it seems to me that the last kiss you gave me is
yet warm on my cheek, and the last blessing you murmured
is yet breathing its music to my ear. And now
you do not know me—you will not see me—you turn me
from your door; the heart that I once thought mine
proves strange and cold, and the hand, that in the sight
of men and angels was mine, you have given, you have
sold, to another. And do you think that that other will
love you with a love like mine, with a faith, a truth, a
devotion like mine? He has towers, and halls, and vassals,
and heaps of treasure; but what are these to love?
He may boast of his long, unbroken line of ancestry,
but can he tell you of an undivided heart? He may
give you rank in the land, and clothe you with jewels,
and surround you with slaves—but will he make your
image his bosom's queen, to reign there supremely and
alone? will he unlock to you the treasures of all his secret
thoughts, and all his best and fondest affections?
will he devote to you the service of his own exertions,
his entire solicitude, his earnest cares, his very dreams?
But I would, Emma—and I tell you now, that the time
may come, when in all the glare of his lighted chambers,
and amid crowds of his gay retainers, you will feel
alone; and though the harps and the cymbals are ringing,
and the songs of minstrels are loud, you will not
hear them; and though the masquers and dancers are
passing and repassing before your eyes, you will not
see them; and the torches may blaze, and the revel
wax high—yet you will heed nothing and mark nothing—
for your soul will not be there—it will be wandering on
the cool river bank, in the moon's pale light, or the
grove's deep shade; it will visit the green lane, and the
lowly cottage, and mayhap the poor peasant, who lived,
and would have died for you. Forgive me, Emma, if I
distress you; I still love, shall ever love you, and
though you have made life as nothing to me, I hope, but
can only hope, that it will be full of blessing for you.
I have done with its pursuits and pleasures, and no
longer acknowledge its relations. I shall retire to the
monstery whose turrets you see rising from the valley,
and spend the sad remnant of my days in prayer. Before
the throne of Heaven, you will never be forgotten;
in the silent cell your form will be constantly before me;
in the early matin song, and the sweet vesper hymn, and
the solemn midnight vigil, your dear name will rise unbidden
to my lips, and be cherished in the holiest devotions
of my heart. Farewell, farewell!'

Emma was far from being insensible, and the shock
occasioned by this letter threw her into a violent fever,
in the delirium of which she was constantly raving of
Edred. As she gradually recovered, however, her
feelings of compunction and remorse became less poignant,
and she again received the visits of the baron with
composure.

He, on his part, fearing some other untoward accident,
urged their immediate nuptials. Everything was
prepared, and as soon as Emma was able to leave her
chamber she was conducted, or rather conveyed, by her
successful lover, her parents, and her sister, to the village
church, where their arrival was expected by one
of the neighbouring monks, who had been previously
engaged to perform the ceremony.

As the marriage was to be strictly private, in order to
shun the observation of the villagers, who were highly
incensed at the parties, the evening was chosen for the
time of its solemnization; and the recesses of the church
were already wrapped in gloom, and a faint light scarce
struggled through the painted windows, as the party advanced
up the aisle, and drew around the altar.

The monk opened his ritual, and in a hurried voice
began to read the service. He had proceeded but a
few lines, when a deeper shade suddenly pervaded the
church, and these words were distinctly heard,—`The
banns are forbidden!'—`Ha! by whom' cried the terrified
ecclesiastic. `By Heaven and earth; by God and
man!' answered the unearthly voice. `Nay, then, I
cannot—' `Go on!' thundered the angry baron, `go
on, I say, stupid, cowardly dotard, and mind not the
shallow trick of some vile clown, who shall dearly rue
this interruption, as thou shalt too, sir fool, if thou dost not
despatch.' Thus threatened, the intimidated monk resumed
the service, and came to that part of it in which
he asked the baron, in the prescribed form, if he would
have Emma for his wedded wife. `I will,' was the
prompt reply. Turning then to Emma, he asked her if
she would have the baron for her wedded husband. She
spoke not, and stirred not, and the sharp, short echo of
the vaulted roof returned, as if in mockery, the last
word of his question—and all was silent again. `Art
thou possessed, maiden, that thou respondest not to the
holy words?' said the monk, in a tone in which fear,
vexation, and impatience were blended—`what is in
thee, that thou canst not pronounce two simple syllables?
and here, the while, it has grown so dark, the saints of
Heaven preserve us! that I can hardly see to read this
holy sacrament of matrimony; and much I fear that I
shall not reach our refectory in due season, for methinks

the hour of supper must be already past, and
this place feels strangely cold, wherefore I pray thee,
maiden—' But here he seemed to have lost on a sudden
all power of utterance, and his discourse was cut
off in the midst. Emma's sister, surprised at her persevering
silence, and indeed the silence, and unmoving
features of the whole company, left her place, ran up to
her, and laying her hand gently on her shoulder, `My
sister, my dearest Emma!' she began—`but, gracious
Virgin! what is this? how deadly cold you are! as
cold—as cold—' she could say no more, but sunk down
lifeless on the pavement of the chancel.

The morrow was Sunday; and as the villagers assembled
in the church, a strange and awful vision met their
bewildered eyes—a regular assemblage of upright stones,
occupying the holiest place, and throwing their long,
still shadows over the aisles, as the morning sun glanced
through the eastern window. It was attempted to remove
them, but they yielded not in the least to the
utmost efforts which could be employed. The brethren
of the monastery were summoned; who, informed of
the prodigy, approached the church in long procession,
bearing lighted waxen tapers, and chanting hymns and
burning incense. As they ranged themselves before the
altar, the abbot pronounced a solemn incantation, while
his companions flung holy water on the charmed stones;
but it was all without effect—sacred spell and human
strength were alike unavailing, and the solid masses
remained unmoved.

The church was deserted; no one would worship in
it, for they said that it was God-forsaken. It gradually
went to decay, its roof and walls fell in, and the materials
were dispersed; but still those mysterious stones stood
up, unhurt and unshaken. Of the church there is not

now a vestige to be discovered; but those same stones
are here, and here they will stay till the day of doom.

This short thick stone, standing alone in the midst of
the others, is the venal monk. That tall one opposite
him is the bridegroom. These are the parents of the
bride. This one, lying prostrate on the ground, is her
sister. And that slender one, next to her, is the bride
herself, the fair, but faithless Emma.

Do you see the flat blue stone, hard by in that hollow,
half hidden by the long grass and the bending hyacinth?
It covers the grave of brother Lawrence, who intreated
to be buried in this spot. They say that it is only around
this stone that the grass and the wildflowers will grow;
and it is also said, that brother Lawrence and the
peasant Edred were the same.

I was told, that the following custom had prevailed
among the swains of Stanton-Drew, from that time to
the present, and that it had been attended with the best
effects. When any one of them has reason to suspect
that the allurements of wealth or station may seduce
from him the affections of his mistress, he leads her to
this enchanted circle, and repeats to her the tradition of
THE WEDDING.

THE EXILE AT REST.

BY THE REV. JOHN PIERPONT.

UNWRITTEN POETRY.

BY N. P. WILLIS.

WORDSWORTH.

There is poetry that is not written. It is living in
the hearts of many to whom rhyme is a mystery. As I
here use it, it is delicate perception; something which
is in the nature, enabling one man to detect harmony,

and know forms of beauty better than another. It is
like a peculiar gift of vision; not creating a new world,
but making the world we live in more visible; enabling
us to combine and separate and arrange elements
of beauty into the fair proportions of a picture. The poet
hears music in common sounds, and sees loveliness by
the wayside. There is not a change in the sky, nor a
noise of the water, nor a sweet human voice, which does
not bring him pleasure. He sees all the light and hears
all the music about him—and this is poetry.

To one thus gifted, nature is a friend of many sweet
offices and true consolations. Call it visionary if you
will, she has glad fellowship for the happy, and medicine
for the wounded spirit, and calm communion for
gentle thoughts, which are the life of his moral being.
Let him seek her when he will, if his heart be anything
but dead, the poor sympathy of the world is a mockery
to her ministering influences. I dare go farther. The
power of nature over such a mind as I have described,
is, in cases of extreme mental suffering, or abandonment,
stronger than any other moral influence.[1] There is
something in its deep and serene beauty, inexpressibly
soothing to the diseased mind. It steals over it silently,
and gradually, like an invisible finger, erasing its dark
lines and removing its brooding shadows, and before he is
aware, he is loving, and enjoying, and feeling, as he did in
better days when his spirit was untroubled. To those who
see nothing about them but physical convenience, these
assertions may seem extravagant; but they are nevertheless
true; and blessed be the Author of our faculties,

there are some who know, by experience, that nature is
a friend and a physician to the sick and solitary spirit of
her worshipper.

Paul Lorraine, by the above definition, was a poet.
He had been what is called a strange child. It was a
way of saying that they did not understand him. His
unbounded gladness when gay, and his singular depression
at times, were unaccountable. He was as docile
and affectionate as a girl; but he would wander away
on a summer morning and neglect his books like a very
truant. He never could resist the stirrings of spring,
and the smallest bird that went singing over him on his
way to school, tempted him off irresistibly. His spirit
revolted at confinement in such seasons, and when chid
for absence, his spirit rose within him and he answered
indignantly. On one of these occasions he was punished
with a blow. I remember it as if it were yesterday.
He was perfectly transformed. The delicate, quiet boy
whom we expected to submit, and weep, sprang to his
feet with the sternness of a lion. He compressed his
beautiful lip, and his eye flashed for a moment—and
then he stood calm and immoveable till the blood gushed
from his nostrils. It was the last attempt to subdue
him, and he was left to his own waywardness.

At fourteen Paul Lorraine was the most engaging
being I ever saw. He was tall for his years, and surpassingly
graceful; but his face won you like a spell.
It was not its regularity; not its clear, transparent complexion;
not his fine eye, with its long, shadowy lashes;
but a delicious melancholy that was refreshing, like the
twilight, to look upon. He was happier than most boys;
often gay; but whatever the expression of the moment,
and whatever the change in features that were singularly
flexible, the calm, angelic seriousness of that look
was always there. His person was apparently slight;

but exquisite symmetry, and the exercise of his early
wanderings, had given it compactness, and the airy
glide of his step was almost unearthly. His bearing
was modest, and the habitual sadness of his countenance
chastened it much; but no one could be long in
his presence, without discovering that the chivalry of a
highminded boy was among his readiest impulses.

Is it singular that such a being should be loved? that
in the early maturity of uncommon sensibilities, he
should himself love, passionately? Perhaps it was the
fault of his character that he was too susceptible. He
certainly never could resist the delightful language of a
woman's unmeant preference; and if this is a sin, it is
the shadow of a virtue—a consequence inseparable from
the very delicacy which ennobled him. I am not sure
that the blush which betrayed the secret of Marion Graham,
was not the first shot from the quiver we read of;
but be that as it may, a truer affection never stirred the
fine chords of the human bosom than the love of Paul
Lorraine for that bewitching fairy. I have seen her often.
I have played with her, by daylight, and moonlight,
a thousand times; and I could describe her; but
he has done it himself, better. He wrote the verses
which follow in school, on a blank leaf of his Virgil:

At twentyfive, Paul had mingled with the world. He
had been caressed more than was good for his character,
and had dipped deeper into pleasure than his better angel
whispered him was innocent. He had learned to
wear armor upon his feelings, and could go free among
companions whose want of delicacy and consideration
would have wounded him, once, like arrows. He had
become what is called a man of the world, of the better
order; such an one as women select for a defender, and
men for an umpire in the nice distinctions of honor.
He was to a certain degree, master of himself, and always
a ruling spirit with others; a noble nature, that
had suffered plausible, but false principles to graft themselves
upon it. His worldly accomplishments, however,
were as yet but the dress of the masquerader, and his
heart was beating still, beneath it, with the fine impulses
that wrought upon his boyhood. He had kept the poetry
of his feelings apart from their profanation; and in the

midst of gaiety, it would visit him like a palpable touch,
and lead him away in a rich dream to the beautiful
treasures of his fancy. A reach of moonlight on a
wall, or a glimpse of a bright star through the window
of a ballroom, was talisman enough; and the contemplations
of his early years would come at such bidding,
and refresh him in the depth of a forgetfulness that
would seem to be total. How often have I followed
him from a crowded room, to see him lean over a balustrade,
and with the merry laugh of `fair women and
brave men' ringing in his ear, look up to the clear
heavens with the enthusiastic and simple fervor of a
child!

To Marion he was true. She had grown up as he
knew she must, with a heart too deep, and a mind too
ardent for the light frame which imprisoned them. She
was as delicate as a flower; but oh! her love was the
breath of her being, that would one day exhaust it.
She had the quick perceptions of her sex, united to the
strong, intuitive capacities of genius. Her acquirements
had elevated and expanded them; and without a
knowledge of the world, or the trick of fashion, she
stood alone among women like a `particular star,' and
won from all the unqualified admiration she did not value.

The love that Paul had begun with a boy's rash vow,
was matured into a strong affection. It was the whole
tide of his aim in life to be worthy of Marion. There
were obstacles in the way of his happiness, however,
which, in the opinion of his friends, made the attainment
difficult, if not improbable. He was not rich, and had
no apparent preference for any profession or business.
While this was the case, a connexion was, of course,
by the principles of this `working day world,' not to be
thought of; and the fear on this subject, by those who
knew the temper of his mind, was formidable. It had

been, however, a theme of much reflection to him, and
the subject, in his own feelings, wore a brighter aspect.
His views, it is certain, were yet romantic, and he did
not quite realize the dull servitude of business; but he
had naturally a penetration and common sense, which
were singular in a mind so gracefully gifted, and the
sweet vision of Marion Graham, was, in his own view,
a sufficient stimulus to all necessary sacrifice.

Society, however, had many claims upon him, and
with the irresistible fascination of his manner, it was not
strange that he became a favorite. It is a trying relation
to hold to the world, and true as it certainly was
that he was not as deliriously devoted to its pleasures as
those with whom he mingled, appearances often warranted
remark, which heavily clouded the hopes of
Marion. If his character had been better understood,
she would have been spared the trial; but the air which
he put on like a mantle, was to ordinary men the acquisition
of half a life; and the hours he gave to society,
and which were, to him, a relief from books, were to
ordinary men dissipation, unfitting them for all serious
employment. Who should know that the overflow of
his spirit was more than their whole capacity? Who
should know that the rich beauty of his language, and
the authentic elegance of his address, were the original
of their studied imitation? It was here that the candid,
and the lenient, misunderstood, and misrepresented him.
They believed upon common principles, and spoke with
the persuasion of truth, and it required all the philosophy
of Marion, not to tremble at the asserted tendency
of his career.

Lorraine was otherwise mistaken, and the result became
the fever of her spirit. I have said that he was
susceptible. He never ceased to love her. There was
never a moment when he would not have preferred her

immeasurably to a world of his reputed idols. But away
from her sweet voice, and under the bewildering influence
of music and excitement, he would be tempted into
a momentary homage which was repeated to her with
the coloring of scandal, till her heart was sick. It was
not that she believed them. She knew in her clear
judgment that his devoted manner was misconstrued,
and his native ardor too far above the level of his fellows
to be attributed to ordinary feeling; but the continual
dropping which wears away a stone is a true emblem
of the unquiet heart, and she wore away beneath it.

Unavoidable circumstances kept him at a distance,
and they seldom met. But with all the hallowed delicacy
and deep tenderness of their love, that brief intercourse
was constrained and painful. It was natural
that it should be so. Her cheek glowed in his presence
like the lip of a child; but a less practised eye might
discover the history of sad, weary thought beneath it.
He knew its intensity; and it was not strange, as she
leaned feebly on his arm, that dark thoughts overshadowed
his happiness. Could she be happy? This `wearing
away to the land of the leal' is not the stealthy
ministry they call it. It tells truly of its progress. And
it is only when the shortened pulse and the difficult
breath are wilfully disregarded, that the last call is a
surprise to the sufferer. Could she be happy? She
looked upon his noble forehead, and his manly beauty,
and asked herself if the siren world would pass him by
with its manifold temptations. It was no weakness of
her trust. But the bias of elements so warm, and the
workings of a spirit so unlike the tame temper of his
fellows, might surely warrant anxiety in one who waited
on their destiny. She remembered that the minute,
and, to him, almost contemptible policy of life
must be adopted; that his fine powers must be condensed

and turned to profit; that he must forget his
beautiful fancy, and forsake the attractions of frequented
circles, and be no more alone with nature; that he must
meet fraud, and calculation, and be patient with absurdity,
and familiar with the low artifice of the shrewd;
that he must change, totally; and for what? Riches!
And would he do it? Yes, Marion! To fold you to
his bosom, to take you to himself; shelter, protect,
cherish you, were enough to bear him on, were it ten
times the sacrifice.

I have often thought that the fine spirits who are
sometimes seen among us, were commissioned angels,
gifted with bodies that should release them gently when
their errand was done. It is to me almost a conviction.
The frames of the very purest human beings whom it is
our blessedness to know, are often so delicately balanced;
they seem so readily and lightly to depart when the
brightness of their life is overcast; to live so entirely to
bless, and to die so truly at the hour when the sorrow of
the world would overtake them, that I cannot think it a
dream.

Marion Graham was such an one. The fragile beauty
of her form was more the delicacy of an ephemeron
than the proper symmetry of a creature that would endure.
It was evident in her childhood that the first
shock given to her spirit would disengage it; and though
many wept, none wondered when she visibly failed and
assumed the treacherous loveliness of consumption.
The anxieties of which I have spoken, and the constant
fervor of a love which kept her heart feverish with excitement,
were too much, and it was apparent that she
was going down rapidly to the grave. It was not kept

from Lorraine, and he was prostrated with the blow.
He had feared and expected it long; but it came upon
him with the suddenness of a thunderbolt. The human
heart is a subtle deceiver, and never believes till truth
is inevitable; and that Marion would die—so soon! before
he had pressed her to his heart, and called her his
own, had, even to his darkest forebodings, seemed impossible.
I cannot describe his feelings. He could
not, adequately, himself. He was not permitted to go
to her while a shadow of a hope remained, and he sunk
into a stupor which seemed almost the calmness of delirium.
I went to him one day, and found him more
cheerful than usual. He had been writing the verses
copied below, and it had relieved him. He handed
them to me with a melancholy smile, and said they were
his last poetry.

A few weeks elapsed, and Lorraine looked hourly for
a summons to her death bed. It came, and he obeyed
it with a sick heart and a wasted frame. The right of
affection is acknowledged at such an hour, and he was
led to her room immediately on his arrival.

—Could that be Marion? She, who lay before him
with that radiant smile, was that the suffering, exhausted,
dying Marion he looked to see? He gazed a moment
on her face, and passed his hand over his eyes as
if to know that it was not a dream; then going up to the
bedside, he bent slowly and solemnly over her, and
kissed her delicate lips as if the breath of an angel had
made them holy. He was unprepared for a scene so
different from his conceptions of death. She was so
calm, so serene, so lovely in a decay that seems to
anticipate the excellent beauty of heaven; her eye was

so unnaturally bright, and her illumined features so like
the `shining faces' of inspired description, that he was
awed as by the presence of a spirit. She closed her
eyes, and was visibly agitated for a few minutes; then,
in a clear, sweet voice, she called him and he again
leant over her. She spoke of her love; her former unkind
fears, and present trust in his affection; of her
hope in God, and her desire that he should seek Him
earnestly; and requesting that he would once more
press his lips to hers, became insensible. Presently
she revived—shivered slightly—and, looking up to his
face with the smile of a seraph—died!

Spring, beautiful spring, with its delicious breath,
and its new leaves, and its gladness for every living
thing and creature under heaven, had come on, and
with the perfection of its last, lagging foliage we began
our wanderings. Lorraine was still an invalid, but better
than we had dared to hope. Sickness had dealt severely
with him the past winter, and a depression which he
could not shake off, chequered with occasional delirium,
threatened the total overthrow of his reason. He had
so far recovered now as to bear the fatigue of travelling,
and we trusted much to the sweet influences of the
season for a restoration of both body and mind.

We turned westward, and in a few days entered the
valley of the Mohawk. I could write a book upon its
sunsets, and the exquisite beauty of its banks and
waters, but I must pass it without description. We
loitered long and pleasantly upon its graceful windings,
and though it won no smile or evidence of exhilaration
from Lorraine, I could see that he was interested, and

now and then beguiled of his dark thoughts, and I hailed
it as a promise of better things.

On one of the balmiest mornings that ever broke, we
descended the rude steps leading to the bed of the
Trenton Falls. For some days I had perceived no
change in Lorraine, and I began to fear, that the appearances
upon which I had built my hopes, were but
the effect of physical excitement, and that his diseased
mind was beyond the skill of nature. We reached the
bottom, and stood upon the broad, solid floor, a hundred
feet down in the very heart of the rock, and in my
first feeling of astonishment, even my interest in his impressions
was forgotten; but its sublime grandeur had
awakened him, and when I recovered my self-possession,
he stood with his hands clasped, and his fine face
glowing with surprise and pleasure. His figure had assumed
the erect, airy freedom for which he was once
remarkable, and as we went on, the alacrity of his step
was delightful.

In a few minutes we stood below the first fall. The
whole volume of the river here descends fifty feet at a
single leap. The basin which receives it is worn into
a deep, circular abyss, and the dizzy whirl and tumult
of the water is almost overpowering. We ascended at
the side, and at a level with the top of the fall, passed
under an immense shelf, overshadowing us almost at the
height of a cloud, and advancing a little further, the
whole grand sweep of the river was before us. It was a
scene of which I had never before any conception, and
I confess myself inadequate to describe it. To stand
in the bed of a torrent, which flows for miles through a
solid rock, at more than a hundred feet below the surface;
to look up this tremendous gorge, and see, as far
as the eye can stretch, a river rushing on with amazing
velocity, leaping at every few rods over a fall, and sinking

into whirlpools, and sweeping round projecting rocks
constantly and violently; to see this, and then look up
as if from the depths of the earth to the giant walls that
confine it, piled apparently to the very sky, this is a sensation
to which no language that would not seem ridiculous
hyperbole could do justice.

When the first surprise is over, and the mind has become
familiar in a degree with the majestic scope of the
whole, there is something delightfully tranquillizing in
its individual features. We spent the whole day in
loitering idly up the stream, stopping at every fall, and
every wild sweep of the narrow passes, and resting by
the side of every gentle declivity where the water shot
smoothly down with a surface as polished as if its
arrowy velocity were the sleep of a transparent fountain.
There is nothing more beautiful than water. Look at
it when you will—in any of its thousand forms—in motion
or at rest—dripping from the moss of a spring, or
leaping in the thunder of a cataract—it has always the
same wonderful, surpassing beauty. Its clear transparency,
the grace of its every possible motion, the brilliant
sheen of its foam, and its majestic march in the
flood, are matched unitedly by no other element. Who
has not `blessed it unaware?' If objects that meet the
eye have any effect upon our happiness, water is among
the first of human blessings. It is the gladdest thing under
heaven. The inspired writers use it constantly as
an image for gladness, and `chrystal waters' is the
beautiful type of the Apocalypse for the joy of the New
Jerusalem. I bless God for its daily usefulness; but it
is because it is an every day blessing, that its splendor
is unnoticed. Take a child to it, and he claps his little
hands with delight; and present it to any one in a new
form, and his senses are bewildered. The man of warm
imagination, who looks for the first time on Niagara,

feels an impulse to leap in, which is almost irresistible.
What is it but a delirious fascination—the same spell
which, in the loveliness of a woman, or the glory of a
sunset cloud, draws you to the one, and makes you long
for the golden wings of the other?

I trust I shall be forgiven for this digression. It is
one of feeling. I have loved the water from my childhood.
It has cheated me of my sorrow when a homesick
boy, and I have laid beside it in the summer
days when an idle student, and deliciously forgot my
dry philosophy. It has always the same pure flow, and
the same low music, and is always ready to bear away
your thoughts upon its bosom, like the Hindoo's barque
of flowers, to an imaginative heaven.

I had not troubled Lorraine with conversation. I
thought it better to leave him to his own thoughts and
the sweet influences about him. It seemed to accord
with his feelings, and in the whole day's wanderings
he had scarcely spoken. Late in the afternoon
we retraced our steps, and as reascended from the
glen, and threaded the green path homeward, the golden
light of the sunset streamed into the wood, touching
the tassels of the pine, and the stooping boughs of
the hemlock, as if with living fire. It seemed as if the
beautiful forms of the elements were leagued against
Lorraine's melancholy, and as he went before me with
an elastic step, stopping to gaze up through the trees
at every reach of the sky, I thanked God in my heart
for the surpassing loveliness of nature.

The moon shone sweetly that night. Paul wrapped
himself in his cloak, and we went out to walk. The
light lay softly upon the hills. The thin exhalations rose
up and floated just palpably in the air; and a scent of
wild flowers was abroad, as if the fairies were dancing
on them in every green nook of the wilderness. I believe

moonlight is sent for the feelings. It certainly
makes some men better. There is an influence about
it which cannot be resisted, and which glides into the
heart with its subtle power, stealing away its grossness,
and covering its dark thoughts like the ministry of an
angel. Lorraine's mind had been aroused and prepared
for such visitation. It melted him to a child. We sat
down on a rock and he spoke for the first time of Marion.
He wept freely, but silently, and without pain; for
the fountains were broken up that had long been too full.
He said the intolerable load of his heart was shaken off;
that the image of Marion in the grave which had so
haunted him, was removed, and he could think of her
now as a pure spirit. Nature to his eye was changed.
He had felt all day as if its light were coming back,
and the moonlight was once more like the moonlight of
his boyhood. He did not feel that he should so soon
die.

My story is done. I have no catastrophe to tell.
My object was to write the history of a mind such as
I have known, and exhibit nature as the physician and
friend I believe she is. If my simple page should touch
pleasantly a chord in the heart of any lover of her
sweet influences, or lead one desponding mind to go
out and be happy, its end will be answered.

DESCRIPTIVE SONNETS.

BY H. PICKERING.

THE SKY.

AUTUMNAL PICTURE.
A SKETCH.

THE RAINBOW.
AFTER A SUMMER TEMPEST.

SUNLIGHT AT EVENING.

THE CLOUDS.
BY GRENVILLE MELLEN.

THE PAMPAS PLAINS OF BUENOS AYRES.

BY I. M'LELLAN.

Head's Journey over the Pampas and Andes.

NEW OXFORD.

BY THE AUTHOR OF `MORAL PIECES.'

The rash intolerance of Louis the Fourteenth reached
its climax in the revocation of the Edict of Nantz.
That mad persecution of the Huguenots, which he
styled `zeal for the extirpation of heresy,' might not
subside until it had deprived his realm of half a million
of his most valuable subjects. `France,' said Queen
Christina, `is like a diseased man, who submits to the
amputation of legs and arms, to cure a disease, which
gentle treatment might conquer.' The Huguenots had
endured the evils of an insolent soldiery quartered in
their habitations, who, under the pretence of converting
them to the Catholic faith, committed every outrage
upon their property, persons, and families. Many were
forced to become wanderers, or to take shelter in caves,
and others yielded their lives to torture, rather than sin
against the dictates of conscience. Still in their deepest
depression, the edict of Henry of Navarre, which, in
1589, had given peace to their suffering fathers, continued
to administer hope to them, until the fatal
December of 1685, when it was revoked. They now
every moment expected a repetition of the horrors of

St Bartholomew. Flight was their only alternative,
and to this many obstacles were opposed. Armed
guards were stationed by the despot, to prevent their
escape from the kingdom. Fathers were forced to immure
their families in damp caverns, for temporary
concealment, whence they issued, pale and emaciated.
Delicate females, whom the breath of heaven had never
before visited roughly, might be seen wandering unprotected
amid the chill of winter; or in the recesses of
some forest, a mother might be discovered hushing her
wailing infant, lest its cries should direct the pursuit of
the brutal soldier. Yet guided by that God whom they
served, hundreds of thousands fled their beloved country
and unnatural monarch, and found a peaceful refuge
among pitying strangers. `What multitudes,' says the
Abbé Millot, `of merchants, mechanics, officers, and
learned men, were thus irrevocably lost to France?'

The New World profited by this prodigality of the
Old; nor was it of slight consequence, that among the
elements of our national character, were blended the
diligence, patience, and piety of a race faithful unto
death for conscience' sake. Among those Huguenots
who brought to our shores a wealth more incorruptible
than silver or gold, were the congregation of the
Reverend Pierre Daillé, a descendant of the learned
John Daillé, author of the celebrated `Apology for the
Reformed Churches.' They had been fortunate in
effecting an escape, with the loss of but few of their
number; and in two small vessels, Le Coligni and La
Marguerete, directed their course to the shores of New
England. The perils of their scantily appointed voyage,
and the dangers of approaching our coast during the
severity of a wintry snow storm, we do not mean to
recount. Suffice it to say, that they arrived in Boston,
worn and weary, but full of gratitude to their Preserver,

and were received with that kind hospitality, which still
makes so strong a feature in the character of that beautiful
city. Little more than threescore years had elapsed
since the first footsteps of our pilgrim ancestors explored
the wilds and rocks of Plymouth. A few of these survived
with hoary locks, to welcome the persecuted
strangers, and bless that martyr spirit, with which their
own had such strong affinity. The remainder of the
winter was passed by the exiles in Boston, during which
negotiations were concluded with Governor Dudley for
the purchase of a tract of land for their future residence.
It comprised the site which the present town of Oxford
now occupies, in the county of Worcester, at the distance
of about thirty miles from Boston. The river
which intersects its beautiful vales, received from the
emigrants the name of French River, which it still retains;
but why they preferred for their settlement the
appellation of New Oxford to some of the more romantic
ones which the recollections of their native clime might
have furnished, tradition does not inform us.

As soon as the season permitted, some of the most
hardy of the strangers, with a guide and assistants from
the coast, went to take possession of their territory, to
erect a few temporary habitations, and, in the technical
language of the country, to `make a clearing.' Spring
had a little advanced when the more delicate part of the
colonists followed. The young turf was springing, and
the silver leaf of the willow had hung out its banner.
They entered on their hardships and privations with a
cheerfulness which nothing could subdue.

In those forests where Silence had reigned since the
creation, they found a temple where God might be
worshipped, free from the tyranny of man; and they
who had been accustomed to the comforts of a luxuriant
clime, went forth to their daily labor amid tangled

thickets, and returned nightly to their rude cabin, `an
everlasting hymn within their souls.' Next to the care
of providing habitations was that of erecting a small fort,
as a refuge in case of an incursion of the aborigines.
The tribe of Nipmuck Indians were borderers upon
their territory, but evinced friendly dispositions toward
the new settlers. A shelter from the storm, or a covert
for the night was occasionally granted these children of
the forest, and this simple hospitality seemed the groundwork
of lasting amity.

A few years wrought manifest changes in this infant
colony. An air of neatness, and even of comfort, began
to pervade the simple dwellings. Each had a spot
devoted to the purposes of horticulture, where the seeds
of France were already springing, as if forgetful that
they grew in a foreign soil, and her vines putting forth
their graceful tendrils, and timidly seeking a support.

The pastor who had led his flock into the wilderness,
took part in their labors and sorrows with a zeal which
knew no declension. He aided them with his advice, or
sat by their bed of disease, soothing their afflictions and
heightening their joys by the hope of heaven. Piety
was not with him merely a garb for the sabbath; every
day it was seen walking with him, and enlightening the
steps of others. It was impossible to be long in his
presence without perceiving that his heart was above,
not by moroseness or contempt of earthly cares, but by
a secret and powerful influence which was ever lifting
upward the thoughts of others. In his familiar visits to
each domestic altar, amid the unrestrained flow of discourse
which prompted every heart to pour out itself to
him, an ejaculation, or the simple raising of his benign
eye to heaven, was a signal to his confiding and half
adoring flock, for the spirit to commune with its Father,
if it were only through the aspiration of a moment.

His wife, whose education and manners might have
qualified her to move in courts, found no greater
pleasure than in lending her aid to her beloved partner,
in the instruction of the children of their people, and
the comfort of the sick and the mourner.

The fourteenth anniversary of the settlement of New
Oxford approached. Every thing wore the appearance
of a colony prosperous by its own industry. Some had
exchanged their early dwellings for others of a better
construction; and several had been added, for those
who in childhood quitted their native land, yet had
themselves become the founders of families. In their
simple and unvitiated state of society, marriage, being
solely the result of love, knew none of those obstructions
which fashion and self-interest often interpose in
its path. It was also contracted at an early period, for
where celibacy is considered a dereliction of Nature's
dictates, the approaches toward its boundary are deemed
ungraceful. That false refinement or coldness of calculation,
be it which it may, which prompts the inhabitants
of cities, to defer a union which is to cheer the winter
of life, until the beauties of its spring are past, was
unknown here. An ordinance whose influence is so
powerful over the destinies both of mortality and immortality,
they held it desirable to solemnize ere the heart
was rendered insensible by time, or the affections rigid
by disappointment. Many of the more recently bridal
tenements were tastefully ornamented with flowering
shrubs, and trained vines, and not one in the settlement
was without a garden appropriated to the cultivation of
vegetables. That of Father Daillé was principally a
nursery of young fruit trees and medicinal plants. His
skill in horticulture enabled him to transplant from
among the former many acceptable presents for his

people, while his knowledge of the science of medicine
instructed him successfully to apply the latter to the
relief of their physical infirmities. As yet no diseases
of a serious nature had appeared among them. They
forcibly illustrated how much industry promotes health
of body, and moderated desires, health of mind. All
were zealous to impart to their beloved pastor those
productions for which they could not endure that a care
should enter his mind, or divide his thoughts from their
spiritual welfare. He created also another claim upon
their affections, by assuming, in a great degree, the
instruction of their children. His mind, deeply imbued
with science, could not tolerate the idea that the rising
generation should grow up in that ignorance which is so
often the misfortune of new colonies. He appointed,
therefore, to the boys and young men, stated lessons in
the necessary departments of knowledge, judiciously
adapted to their difference of age or capacity, and regularly
convened them at his house for examination. His
pastoral visits were always so conducted as to be subservient
to the pursuits in which his pupils were engaged.
It was then his delight to bestow explanation, to encourage
perseverance, and to rouse indolence from slumber.
An ardor to excel was thus strongly excited, and amid
the daily processes of agricultural labor, animated conversations
might be heard founded on their respective
studies. Those whose proficiency was respectable, were
admitted to his familiar lectures upon the higher branches
of science and literature, and this was an honor sufficient
to stimulate every exertion. Thus the good man had
the satisfaction of perceiving his young charge initiated
into that general knowledge which gives to thought
liberality and resource. He could not fail to perceive
that his influence over their opinions and affections was
becoming unbounded; and he often thought, as he contemplated
his little seminary, `are ye not all branches
of my planting?'

Madame Daillé also extended the same care over the
young females. Each, after being taught to read by the
mother, attended her stated recitations. Here they repeated
the lessons which had been assigned, and were
questioned respecting their practical knowledge of the
various departments of female industry and virtue. To
gain her approbation was an object worthy to stimulate
every effort, while her frown was dreaded like the reproof
of conscience. Having herself received a finished
education, it was impossible for her to maintain
an intercourse of this nature, without imparting its benefits.
Not only superior intelligence marked the more
distinguished among her scholars, but all under her care
displayed a correctness of deportment, and courtesy of
manner, which are usually acquired only among the
more polished classes of society. It was her custom at
the close of her weekly examinations, to relate either
some historical fact, or some invention of her own prolific
imagination, which, in the form of a concise story,
illustrated moral truth, reproved the errors which fell
under her observation, or enforced the principles of piety.
Yet it was not the intention of this highly cultivated
lady, to turn the attention of her pupils too exclusively
to literature, aware that in a new colony there are
duties to be discharged, by her sex, for which no intellectual
eminence will compensate.

She would sometimes point to the fields of flax, whose
blossoms tinged with a fine blue the vale around them,
and expatiate on the excellence of those arts which
could render this plant so subservient to the comfort of
those whom they loved. Hence the distaff, the loom,
and the needle, were considered honorable and graceful
appendages, and every household was desirous that

its internal manufactures should not only be equivalent
to its own wants, but to the aid of those whom sickness
might preclude from their accustomed diligence. On
Saturday evening the two schools met each other, to
receive instruction in those principles of religion which
are of common concern, and to practise sacred psalmody,
it being the wish of Father Daillé, that all his congregation
should be qualified to lift up, as with one
voice, the high praises of God. There was something
inexpressibly affecting in the pouring forth of that foreign
music in this new land; the soft summer breezes,
and the echo of the woods, seemed to prolong the cadence,
as if they strove to naturalize the stranger melody.

Thus peaceful and happy were the Huguenots whose
fortunes we have hitherto pursued. The simple toils of
agriculture gave them health and subsistence, the vain
pursuit of wealth had not diseased their imaginations,
nor the poison of ambition corrupted their hearts. Each
householder considered the portion of ground attached
to his habitation as his own. The remainder was an
undivided, undisputed possession. Their herds drew
nutriment from one common pasture; and on the plantations
of maize or fields of grain, each man bestowed his
portion of labor, and without jealousy divided the harvest.
Lycurgus might have here seen illustrated his
favorite theory of the Laconian brotherhood. No dissonance
of opinion had hitherto arisen, which the advice
of the elders could not harmonize, and the patriarch
Daillé gave daily thanks in his prayer, that one
soul of love seemed infused into all his children.

It is with grief that we darken this scene of more
than Arcadian felicity. In the spring of 1700 it was
deemed expedient to prepare for planting a large piece
of land, at some distance from their earliest clearings,
and thither one fine morning almost all the effective

strength of the colony was gathered. Jeanson, a
man greatly respected for his serene gravity of deportment,
and amiable disposition, having been detained at
home later than his associates, was about taking his
departure to join them, when the report of a musket
was heard, and he fell weltering upon the green turf
that skirted his threshold. Several Indians from an adjoining
thicket then rushed into the house, and a scene
of slaughter and desolation ensued, unparalleled, but in
the annals of savage warfare. Those beautiful children,
the infant in its cradle, the mother, intent upon their
protection, not one was spared. The blood of the innocents
empurpled the hearth stone of their murdered
parents. At the sudden alarm, the colonists collected
with agonized haste, yet too late to overtake the spoilers,
whose flight was as rapid, as their deeds had been
destructive.

The mourning among the colonists it would be in
vain to describe. Each man felt that he had lost a
brother, and as he looked upon his dearest ones, shuddered
lest they also might be stretched before his eyes,
in the same terrible array of death. Apprehensive of
a repetition of evil, necessary measures of precaution
were taken; the more helpless retired to the fort, armed
sentinels were placed for protection during the
night, and the elders of the people met in consultation.
Their countenances, usually so serene, were now variously
marked with grief and indignation.

`Let us,' said Johonnet, with impassioned gestures,
`pursue with the dawn of morning, these barbarians.
We will leave our wives and children in the fort, and
not return until our brother's blood is fully avenged.
The shades of the great Condé and Coligni shall not
reproach us with suffering the lawless murderers to
live.'

Boutineau spoke next, an elder whose hair was silvered.
`Their mode of warfare is as peculiar as their
habits of life. They never meet in open battle, and
who can pursue them into their wilds, and hope to return?
While we are seeking to carry retribution into
their wigwams, they might suddenly fall upon the precious
pledges whom we leave behind, and extinguish
our light forever. Surely our only mode of defence is
in perpetual vigilance, and in never losing sight of our
habitations.'

`That our movements are narrowly watched,' said
Sejourneé, `is evident, from their having waited for the
absence of almost every man able to bear arms, ere
they hazarded this attack. It is not to be supposed
that poor Jeanson had awakened their vindictive feelings,
he, whose intercourse with all mankind was so
peaceful. But the situation of his house, on the outskirts
of the settlement, furnished apparent facility for
satiating their cruelty with the least danger of retaliation.
Does not this create suspicion of latent hostility
towards the whole? And if it exist, will not a foe so
subtle find fitting occasions to gratify it? Who can endure
a life of perpetual watchfulness and dread, yet
which of us will dare to lose sight of his home, lest at
returning he should find his dearest blood flowing
around his threshold?'

Others expressed their opinions, yet ceased by an
anxious appeal to Father Daillé as umpire.

`The tribe upon our boundary,' he answered, `is
powerful, and much influenced by a vindictive prophet,
who strives to instigate them to the extermination of all
white men. This is probably the commencement of a
series of aggressions. Your valor I know. It has been
proved when men's souls were tried in the furnace.
All that mortals could do, for the protection of their domestic

altars, you would do, without a thought of
fear or of repining. Yet ere we enter upon such a
course, it becomes us to count the cost. While you
stand in perpetual armor, the toils by which you gain
subsistence, must decline, or be laid aside. To a peaceful
people, this state of military watchfulness, and sleepless
dread, would rob our brief life of half its value.
Yet should a season of quiet, at any time lull our vigilance,
who could assure us that the war whoop of the
savage, or the midnight conflagration enwrapping our
cottages, would not break our miserable slumbers?

`Brethren and sons, let us return to that city, which
first gave us welcome, when as exiles we came to this
new world. There we shall find that safety, which we
may be either too weak to secure, or forced to purchase
at the expense of the blood of some, who are far dearer
to us than life. Other employments than those of agriculture,
may there procure subsistence for our families,
and eventually we may dispose of these lands to colonists
of more effective strength, or who may more readily
command the aid of government in repelling the aggressions
of the aborigines. Yet if in these prudential
calculations I should be mistaken, still I cannot endure
the thought that another of that number, who are as
jewels in my heart, should be thus sacrificed. Merciless
sons of the forest! “Me have ye bereaved of my children!”
It is enough! However tender may be the ties
which we sunder in leaving this beloved spot, I cannot
consent to remain here, with the hazard of yielding to
the scalping knife of the Indian, one more of these my
children.'

After a protracted consultation, the wish of the pastor
became the decision of all, and the opinion was
unanimous, that if the removal were made, it had better
be immediate. They lingered but to make such preparations

as were unavoidable, and to pay the last sad
obsequies to the departed.

The succeeding day drew near its close, when, bearing
the mangled bodies of the slaughtered family, the
whole colony in solemn procession entered the humble
building which had served for a church. When the six
coffins were laid side by side, the burst of grief was
deep and universal. The man of God waited until the
waves of agony were broken. Furrows of painful
thought were upon his brow, but his bearing was as one
whose heart is in heaven. When there was silence, he
stretched forth his hand to the people.

`Ye come, as the Israelites to their passover, with
loins girded, and staves in your hands, as men in haste
for a journey. He who past through the land of Egypt
in judgment, hath been among us. The blood of our
firstborn is upon the posts and doors of our houses.
Lambs without blemish have been slain, and ye this
day garnish them with bitter herbs. Yet let us not go
forth despairing, though we must journey beneath the
cloud. We will not say, Jehovah hath forgotten us.
So long the recipients of his bounty on this very spot, is
it meet that we should part hence, without once more
uniting in his worship? Ye know that tomorrow is
the fourteenth birthday of this village. We hoped to
have celebrated it with hymns of thanksgiving. Now,
if our incense be robbed of its fragrance, and our melody
mingled with the voices of them that weep, there is
One who hath compassion upon our infirmities, and will
not break the leaf driven before the tempest.

`Many things press upon me to be spoken. But ye
cannot bear them now. Ye are called this day to pass
over the swelling of Jordan. Take the Ark of the Covenant
upon your shoulders. Place yourselves beneath

the wing of the cherubims that overshadow it—arise
and depart, for this is not your rest.

`Scene of our refuge, when our native land cast us
out! thou little Zoar where we prayed that we might
enter from the storm of the Lord! vales where the song
of our industry hath arisen! forests which have yielded
to our stroke! homes of our happiness every year more
dear, hallowed by the smile of joy, and the voice of supplication!
we bid you all adieu. Holy church! consecrated
by our humble prayers, our sacred symphonies,
our hopes that rested not upon this earth, we bid thee
farewell in the name of the Lord. Wherever we wander,
though our tears should drop in the fountains of
strange waters, never will we forget thee, our Zion in
the wilderness! Lifeless remains of the brave and the
beautiful, the virtuous and the beloved, severed branches!
crushed blossoms! what shall we say? Ah! how
often will our sorrowing hearts recall your images, as
they once were—as they now are, stretched before us.
What shall we say? Oh! our souls! nothing is without
God. The Prophet saw him in the whirlwind, and
the fire rending the rock in pieces. Though he maketh
darkness his pavilion, let us wait, as those who yet
hope to see the clear shining of his throne.

`Souls of the departed! if ye have attained that heaven
where the storm beateth not, where tears are wiped
from all eyes forever; if from that clime of bliss, ye behold
us, compassed with infirmity and woe, oh! teach
us how slight all the thorns, the tempests, of this pilgrimage
seem, now ye are at rest. My children, what avails it,
where we pitch our tents for the remnant of this shadowy
life, if the angel who removeth their curtains in a
moment, but find the pure spirit ready to meet its God?'

He ceased, and the services of devotion rose in deep
and solemn response from among the people. Fathers

and mothers knelt amid their children, and with one
voice invoked and blessed the King of kings. The
memory of their sorrows and their fears arose in the
soul's high aspiration, as the flame beareth on its
spire the vanishing smoke towards heaven. Hands
hardened with labor, and faces pale with watching,
the eye of the mother and of the babe, were alike lifted
upward, while they gave thanks to the Father of Mercies.
Then ensued a pause of deep silence, and every
head was bowed down, while the unuttered individual
orison ascended. Still there was a pause. The people
waited for their wonted benediction.

`Part we hence,' said the pastor, `part we hence forever,
without one holy song? While the fountain of our
breath is unsealed, let it give praise to the Preserver.'

He designated a plaintive anthem from the seventh
of Job. It burst forth in sweetness, but soon the dirge-like
melody became tremulous. After the strain, `Oh
remember that our life is wind,' the cadence was so
protracted as to be almost inaudible.

Still feebly and slowly the chant proceeded; `As the
cloud vanisheth away, so he that goeth down to the
grave shall come up no more; he shall not return to his
house, his place shall know him no more.' But music
could not long survive amid the swell of such agitating
emotions. It trembled—one or two quivering voices
prolonged it; but they sank, and tones of sorrow arose
in their stead.

The man of God stood up, and blessed the people,
and with eyes bent to earth, led the way to the churchyard.
There, upon the fresh springing turf, each
coffin was laid by its open cell. Every head was humbled
to the earth, while the pastor, kneeling among the
graves, poured forth fervent supplications, like the
prophet who lifted his censer between the dead and the

living. Tears were upon all faces, as the bodies were
deposited in their narrow house. Children sobbed
aloud, and groans burst from manly bosoms, when the
earth, falling upon the coffins, sent forth that hollow
sound, which he who hath paid the last duties to beloved
dead, hath felt in his soul.

Again the man of God spoke, extending his hand
toward the grassy mounds that surrounded them.

`Graves of our friends! those that have been long
sealed, and those now enriched with new treasure, we
thought that our bones should here have rested with
you. Looking upon you, we have often said, Here too
shall we also be gathered unto our people. Jehovah
humbleth the foresight of man. He knoweth not even
where his bed shall be, when this frail tabernacle falleth
like a frittered garment. Yet what avails it, with what
portion of clay our bodies mingle, if our souls gain the
mansion prepared by their Redeemer? What avails it
whether to the bosom of earth or ocean we resign the
image of the earthly, if we are at last found worthy to
bear the image of the heavenly?

`But, oh! what were man without the promise of a
resurrection! What were he, when the grave whelms
his joys, but for the sure hope of eternal life! What
were we, if now forced to ask in uncertainty and
anguish, Who shall roll us away the stone from the
the door of these sepulchres?

`Mourning souls! come, return unto your God.
He hath smitten, and he alone can heal. He hath
troubled the waters which were at rest, but the Angel
of Mercy still waiteth there, and the wounded spirits
shall be made whole.'

They turned from the place of sepulchres, and the
next sun saw their simple habitations desolate. Not a
sound of rural labor was heard, and no young children

were seen searching for violets which the early spring
had awakened. Scarcely the striking of the Arab tents
produces deeper silence, or a wider solitude. The red
men of the forest roamed at will among those tenantless
dwellings, wreaking an unsatisfied vengeance upon each
vestige of their former inhabitants.

The Huguenots, thus a second time exiled, found in
Boston the welcome reception and peaceful asylum
which they had anticipated.

Their excellences of character were also fully appreciated,
and laid the groundwork of many lasting and
valuable friendships with the native Bostonians. Competence,
and in some cases comparative wealth, rewarded
their diligent application to business; and to
this day, their descendants look back with reverence to
the persevering, unostentatious virtues of their ancestors.
In the course of the year 1713, the lands which
they had vacated were occupied by a second colony,
who retained the name of Oxford, omitting the appellation
of New, which had originally been attached to it.
Their house for public worship, erected four years after
their return to Boston, was situated near the spot where
the present Universalist Church in School Street now
stands, and is designated in the records of those times,
as the French Protestant Church. Father Daillé continued
his accustomed ministrations to his flock, winning
friends by his ardent piety and affable deportment, until
summoned by death to his reward, in 1715. His successor
was the Reverend Andrew le Mercier, author
of the `Church History of Geneva, with a Political
and Geographical Account of that Republic.'

In the Granary Burying Ground in Boston, the graves
of the venerable `Pierre Daillé and Seyre his wife,'
are distinctly visible, with their simple inscriptions.
But it is amid the fair scenery of Oxford, that we are

most forcibly reminded of their images, their privations,
their patience, their lives devoted to the service of God
and to the good of mankind. There also a gray haired
man points out to the traveller a deep hollow in the turf,
and tells him, `Here stood the house of Jeanson, the
French Protestant, who, with his family, perished by the
Indians.' The most aged inhabitants of that pleasant
vale say, that within their remembrance, the hearth
stone on which the brains of those beautiful babes
gushed out, still retained its crimson stain, resisting the
action of the elements long after the dwelling was
dilapidated by time.

But among the most interesting vestiges of this
settlement of the Huguenots, are the ruins of the
rustic fort constructed for their defence, and bearing
the antiquity of nearly a century and an half. There,
within a quadrangle of ninety feet, from whence the
stones have been removed for the convenience of agriculture,
may still be traced the well from whence they
first drew water in this foreign home. Asparagus,
whose seed was originally brought from France, continues
annually to burst the investing mould, a simple witness
of the truth of this history; and peach and apple trees,
probably the descendants of their ancient nurseries,
are entwined by the coarse vine, and varied by the indigenous
rose of this country. Should any one doubt the
veracity of these assertions, let him explore the spot;
trace, through tangled grass, the path of the persecuted
emigrants; behold the monuments of their industry,
their consolation, their defence; put his hand, as it
were, `into the print of the nails, and be no longer
faithless but believing.'

Should he also to skepticism add indifference, let him
seat himself upon those disjointed stones, once the rude
barrier against the ruder savage; recline beneath those

shades so often hallowed by the prayers of Christians,
recall their firmness in danger, their fortitude in affliction,
their chastened joy in prosperity; impress on his
imagination their image, bowing beneath perils in the
wilderness for conscience' sake; and see, if, like the
Lawgiver of Israel, he feel not inclined to `put his
shoes from his feet, because the ground whereon he
standeth is holy.'

ON SEEING A BEAUTIFUL BOY AT PLAY.

BY N. P. WILLIS.

THE HAUNTED GRAVE.

BY E. P. BLOUNT.

EXTRACT FROM A JOURNAL OF AN EXCURSION
FROM MONTREAL TO ST ANDREWS.

BY THE AUTHOR OF `A CANADIAN LEGEND.'

We were now sailing on the Lake of the Two
Mountains, here twentyfive miles broad, the waves as
smooth and polished as a mirror, and gemmed with innumerable
green islands. The shores were in many
places bold and finely wooded, and little flourishing
settlements frequently burst upon the eye, crowned by
a glittering spire, and surrounded by luxuriant and well
cultivated farms; while the western horizon was bounded
by a range of highlands, sometimes swelling into what
in this level country are termed mountains. An Indian
village of considerable extent had long been in view,
and we approached it just where the waters again narrowed
into the channel of the Ottawa. A few canoes
were lightly skimming the waves, navigated by Indians
and squaws, in their fantastic dresses; and in one of
these little barks, Judge Macdonald recognised Big
Tom, a noted chief, preeminently distinguished by the
superior splendor of his tinsel gewgaws, and the number
of red feathers which decorated his head.

These villages, for there are two, separated only by
the church, are inhabited by rival tribes, the Algonquins
and Six Nations. The latter were formerly the most
powerful tribe in North America, and are still lords of
the soil as far as the eye can reach, retaining as hunting
grounds all the immense tracts of forest skirting
the borders of the lake and river, possessions which are
guarantied to them by the laws of the country. They
spend their summers principally in roving expeditions,
and return with the cold weather to enjoy the fruits of
their labors. The Algonquins were a strange tribe from
the banks of the Hudson, who came and took up their
residence in the neighbourhood of the Six Nations.
They were viewed with aversion and distrust by their
powerful rivals, and frequent feuds and skirmishes took
place between them. At length a deeper cause rooted
the hatred which existed between them. It happened
that six bold young chiefs of the Six Nations set off on
a hunting expedition, in pursuit of some peculiarly obnoxious
animal, that had committed great depredations
on their territory; but after several days, they returned,
disappointed and unsuccessful from the chase. Six young
men of the Algonquins, animated by a spirit of emulation
and adventure, and hoping for better success, then went
privately off, in the same pursuit. They proved victorious,
and were returning in triumph with the spoils of
the enemy, when their rivals, jealous of the renown they
would acquire, and mortified at their own defeat, treacherously
waylaid, and murdered them. The relatives of
the unfortunate Algonquins were too feeble to revenge
their death by declaring open war against their formidable
neighbours; but the injury was never forgotten, and
they embraced every opportunity to annoy and harass
their treacherous foe, when they could do it with impunity.
It is now many years since this event happened;

but it has not yet been forgotten or forgiven by the
Algonquins. They, however, from political motives
doubtless, live, in general, peaceably with the Six Nations,
and even occasionally intermarry. The village
belonging to the latter tribe is extensive and ancient.
It was flourishing even so far back as 1611, when Monsieur
Champlain penetrated into the country. That
occupied by the Algonquins was first visible to us.
We admired its neatness, the regularity of its houses,
many of them two stories high, with steep red roofs,
and the white mansion of the chief, situated on a smooth
green turf, apart from the others, and surrounded by
stately forest trees. We were told to suspend our
admiration till we saw the rival village; and, when
opposite the church, a central point, which commanded
a fine view of both, we were forced to acknowledge,
that it indeed exhibited marks of opulence and taste
that would have honored a state of refined civilization.

The tout ensemble was truly beautiful. We were not
sufficiently near to distinguish objects minutely; and
the distance, while it heightened the illusions of fancy,
concealed all the blemishes, and disclosed only the
interesting outlines of the picture. The church is a
large stone building, well proportioned, and, as usual
in Canada, ornamented with a tin covered spire, surmounted
by a cross. Adjoining it, on each side, is a
commodious range of houses, also of stone, inhabited
by the priests of the respective tribes; and, in front of
the whole, a noble avenue of elms stretches for a considerable
distance along the bank of the river. It was
a holiday; and, as we sailed slowly past, we observed
a procession of priests in their black flowing robes, followed
by a multitude of Indians, men and women,
tricked out in feathers and glittering ornaments, with
dark blankets wrapped, like cloaks, about them; each

hostile tribe walking with solemn steps, beneath the
deep shadow of the trees, to meet and throw aside their
animosities, and engage together in the imposing ceremonies
of their religion. It was a picturesque and novel
sight; more like a dream of enchantment, than anything
I ever witnessed. We gazed till each dusky figure had
disappeared from view, and the sound of the vesper bell
mingled its last sweet note with the rippling of the waves.

Around the village were rich pastures, fields of grain
and Indian corn; and beyond it rose a thickly wooded
hill of considerable height and extent, crowned by a
small white chapel, which is distinctly seen from a great
distance. It was placed there in commemoration of
the Passion of our Saviour, and there are two of still
smaller size, on the declivities of the hill. Every year
great multitudes of Catholics, for they are not appropriated
exclusively to Indian worshippers, walk to them
in procession, and celebrate high mass and other offices
of their religion.

At length we came once more within view of the
island of Montreal, and hailed as we would have done
the familar features of a friend, its green mountains and
cultivated plains, its substantial farm houses, and pretty
country seats and villas. Our companion pointed out
to us an object of peculiar interest to our national feelings.
It was a dilapidated windmill, and the grassy
remains of a fort which had fallen into the possession
of our gallant General Montgomery, when he captured
the island, and, near by, the ruins of a house which he
took by assault. The house, it seems, was the residence
of a private French gentleman, but fortified to secure it
from the depredations of the Indians. The general had
peremptory orders to seize upon every fortified place,
and, of course, though with reluctance, felt compelled to
take possession of this, which yielded without resistance.

Fortunately for the traveller, who loves to find traces of
other times, and identify them with natural scenery, it
has never been rebuilt. It stands alone in a peculiarly
romantic spot, half buried in the foliage of gigantic
trees. I should say the walls stand; for scarcely anything
else remains of what it was. They are of stone,
but fast crumbling away, and fringed with moss and
lichens; and the apertures, where once were windows,
are twined with ivy, which curls and wreathes itself
fantastically over the gray and shattered building. It
was a beautiful object, and might have harmonized well
with the landscapes of an older country. I had never
before seen anything which could at all realize the ideas
I have conceived of those European ruins which have
so often charmed my imagination, and I gazed upon it
till its faintest outline had melted away in the distance.

About sunset we approached the St Ann rapids; we
had been watching with interest the gradually increasing
rapidity of the current; and, long before we reached
them, the tremendous roaring of the waters burst upon
our ears. All was haste and preparation. The sails
were lowered, and the Canadian boatmen set up that
hideous shouting and hallooing from one side of the
vessel to the other, which is always a prelude to any
season of peculiar danger or difficulty. The water now
began to foam, and dash, and break with violence over
the rocks. The captain, who seemed rather stupid,
wore an uncommonly anxious look, which attracted my
notice, and I asked him if he had never been over the
rapids before. He replied, that it was the first time he
had ever commanded the boat, but he had often sailed on
the river, and knew the course. Could my heart have
been appalled in the midst of so grand and beautiful a
scene, his ignorance might have occasioned me some
alarm, particularly as I learned that many of the crew

were likewise strangers; but everything was so exciting
and magnificent about me, that my whole attention
was absorbed, and I was only anxious to conceal the
circumstance from my companions, who discovered a
slight uneasiness, and proposed going on shore; a plan
I had no wish to adopt. However, we safely passed
the rapids; the boat plunged, and for an instant almost
sunk in the waves that curled and dashed around her.
Every tongue was silent, and never did I experience a
sensation of such mingled awe and delight. We looked
back upon the fearful pitch, with emotions which it is
impossible to describe. The angry element, bathed in
the rich crimson of the setting sun, was lashing itself
to fury, and, in the midst of the most frightful breakers,
appeared a little bark canoe, whose progress we watched
with intense interest. One moment it rode triumphantly
on the summit of a foaming billow, the next sunk almost
from view, apparently too fragile to withstand the overwhelming
torrent. But it bravely weathered the host
of dangers which beset it, and, shooting swiftly past us,
soon left our more sluggish vessel far behind. We
were now passing the pretty village of St Ann's. Its
church, standing on a little promontory, extending into
the rapids, was a most pleasing object, a beacon in the
midst of rocks and dangers. Just at this time, the wind
again subsided, and left us totally becalmed. Night
was fast approaching, and we began to grow impatient;
for we had entered the St Lawrence, at the end of the
island, and from thence to La Chine its navigation is
rather difficult. The captain, we were now convinced,
knew little of it, as in confirmation of our previous
suspicions, Miss — heard the Judge say to him, just
after we passed the rapids, `Why did you come over
that steep pitch? It was not the right channel.' To
which he replied, `It was the helmsman's fault; he had
never been over before, and knew nothing about it.'
Many of the sailors also were half intoxicated; they
had amused themselves, during the calm in the morning,
with drinking perpetually, and had become noisy and
rude, and were unwilling to use their oars.

At the foot of the rapids, Judge Macdonald showed
us the spot where a most dreadful accident happened in
the spring. Mr and Mrs H., with three children and
three female servants, were passing down the river, on
their way to Quebec. They landed, and walked past
the rapids; but as the children complained of fatigue,
returned to the boat too soon, and were but a few yards
from the shore, when one of the boatmen, who was intoxicated,
by an unskilful use of the oar created an eddy
which tipped the canoe on one side. This alarmed the
servants, who, instead of remaining quiet, rose suddenly
up, and by their imprudence completely overset the
boat. Mr H., who was an excellent swimmer, seized
one of the children but a wave washed it instantly from
his arms. He remained in the water a long time, vainly
searching for the remainder of his family, till entirely
exhausted he was compelled to go on shore, but in a
state bordering on distraction. Mrs H., however, was
most providentially preserved. On dragging the canoe
to land she was discovered fastened in between the
seats, but lifeless and benumbed by her long submersion.
Her recovery, which was almost unhoped for,
seemed miraculous, and it was long before they dared
to inform her of the dreadful extent of her loss. Her
husband was obliged to dissemble and stifle his agony
in her presence, but in private it nearly overpowered
his reason. They shortly after this dreadful event,
proceeded to Quebec. The bodies of the children were
found, brought to town, and buried. One of the servant
women escaped, the others never rose.

Soon after passing this melancholy spot, we met a
large Durham boat, under full sail, streamers flying, and
a band of music playing delightfully. There was a
merry party on board, and among them some gentlemen
of our acquaintance, who saluted us with Yankee
Doodle as they passed. They were striving to clear the
rapids before dark. These were the scenes in which
Moore composed, or rather imitated from the French,
his beautiful Canadian boat song.

Night had now closed around us, and for two or three
hours we made so little progress, that we began to fear
we should be obliged to remain on board all night. We
wished to be put ashore at Point St Clair, but the captain
said the shoals were dangerous, and he did not like
to venture. We were soon however relieved from our
apprehensions, as the wind again rose, and a stiff
breeze wafted us swiftly onward. It was a bright starlight
night; not a cloud was visible on the stainless
azure above us, and the dancing waves beneath
sparkled with the reflected glories of the heavens.
Lights were seen along the shore, and now and then
showed us a small village or solitary cottage in the
midst of surrounding gloom. Judge Macdonald sang
several Highland songs in Gaelic. His voice was rich
and well modulated, and there was a wild sweetness in
the airs that well accorded with the time and place.

The captain and mate held repeated consultations respecting
the situation of La Chine. We found they had
entirely mistaken it, and there were some on board
who thought we had passed it. Poor M., whose head

still continued to ache, fancied we were approaching the
La Chine rapids, and even declared she could hear
their roar. We afterwards found that stouter hearts
among us, had entertained the same fear. About midnight,
however, we entered the desired haven and in a few
minutes were comfortably established for the night in a
neat tavern. We rose at six the next morning, and
after a pleasant ride of nine miles, reached the good
and loyal city of Montreal with keen appetites for
breakfast. Our friends had all arrived on the preceding
evening, and we soon after met to discuss our various
adventures.

THE ANNOYER.

BY N. P. WILLIS.

METASTASIO.

THE GRAVE OF AN UNKNOWN GENIUS.

BY JOSEPH H. NICHOLS.

A FOREST SCENE.

BY H. PICKERING.

THE RAPIDS.

Midnight on board a steam boat, a full moon, and a
soft panorama of the shores of the St Lawrence gliding
by like a vision! I thus assume the dramatic prerogative
of introducing my readers at once to the scene
of my story, and with the same time saving privilege I
introduce my dramatis personæ, a gentleman and lady
promenading the deck with the slow step so natural on
a summer's night, when your company is agreeable.

The lady leaned familiarly on the arm of her companion
as they walked to and fro, sometimes looking at
the moon, and sometimes at her pretty feet, as they
stole out, one after the other, into the moonlight. She
was a tall, queenly person, somewhat embonpoint, but
extremely graceful. Her eye was of a dark blue, shaded
with lashes of remarkable length, and her features,
though irregular, were expressive of great vivacity, and
more than ordinary talent. She wore her hair, which
was of a deep chestnut, in the Madonna style, simply
parted, and her dress, throughout, had the chaste elegance
of good taste—the tournure of fashion without its
extravagance.

Her companion was a tall, well formed young man,
very handsome, with a frank and prepossessing expression
of countenance, and the fine freedom of step and
air, which characterize the well bred gentleman. He

was dressed fashionably, but plainly, and wore whiskers,
in compliance with the prevailing mania. His tone
was one of rare depth and melody; and as he bent
slightly and gracefully to the lady's ear, its low, rich
tenderness had the irresistible fascination, for which the
human voice is sometimes so remarkable.

It was a beautiful night. The light lay sleeping on
the St Lawrence like a white mist. The boat, on
whose deck our acquaintances were promenading, was
threading the serpentine channel of the `Thousand
Isles,' more like winding through a wilderness than following
the passage of a great river. The many thousand
islands clustered in this part of the St Lawrence
seem to realize the mad girl's dream when she visited
the stars, and found them

Nothing can be more like fairy land than sailing among
them on a summer's evening. They vary in size, from
a quarter of a mile in circumference, to a spot just
large enough for one solitary tree, and are at different
distances, from a bowshot to a gallant leap from each
other. The universal formation is a rock of horizontal
stratum, and the river, though spread into a lake
by innumerable divisions, is almost embowered by the
luxuriant vegetation which covers them. There is
everywhere sufficient depth for the boat to run directly
alongside, and with the rapidity and quietness of her
motion, and the near neighborhood of the trees, which
may almost be touched, the illusion of aerial carriage
over land, is, at first, almost perfect. The passage
through the more intricate parts of the channel, is, if
possible, still more beautiful. You shoot into narrow
passes where you could spring on shore on either
side, catching, as you advance, hasty views to the right
and left, through long vistas of islands; or, running
round a projecting point of rock or woodland, open into
an apparent lake, and darting rapidly across, seem running
right on shore as you enter a narrow strait in pursuit
of the covert channel.

It is the finest ground in the world for the `magic of
moonlight.' The water is clear, and, on the night we
speak of, was a perfect mirror. Every star was repeated.
The foliage of the islands was softened into indistinctness,
and they lay in the water, with their well defined
shadows hanging darkly beneath them, as distinctly as
clouds in the sky, and apparently as moveable. In more
terrestrial company than the lady Viola's, our hero might
have fancied himself in the regions of upper air; but as
he leant over the tafferel, and listened to the sweetest
voice that ever melted into moonlight, and watched the
shadows of the dipping trees as the approach of the
boat broke them one by one, he would have thought
twice before he had said that he was sailing on a fresh
water river, in the good steam boat Queenston.

Miss Viola Clay and Mr Frank Gresham, the hero
and heroine of this true story, I should have told you
before, were cousins. They had met lately after a
separation of many years, and as the lady had in the
mean time become the proudest woman in the world,
and the gentleman had been abroad and wore whiskers,
and had, besides, a cousin's carte blanche for his visits,
there was reason to believe they would become very
well acquainted.

Frank had been at home but a few months when he
was invited to join the party with which he was now
making the fashionable tour. He had seen Viola every
day since his return, and had more to say to her than
to all the rest of his relatives together. He would sit
for hours with her in the deep recesses of the windows,

telling his adventures when abroad. At least, it was
so presumed, as he talked all the time, and she was
profoundly attentive. It was thought, too, he must
have seen some affecting sights, for now and then his
descriptions made her sigh audibly, and once the color
was observed to mount to her very temples—doubtless
from strong sympathy with some touching distress.

Frank joined the party for the tour, and had, at the
time we speak of, been several weeks in their company.
They had spent nearly a month among the Lakes, and
were now descending by their grand outlet to Montreal.
Many a long walk had been taken, and many a romantic
scene had been gazed upon during their absence,
and the lady had, many a time, wandered away with her
cousin, doubtless for the want of a more agreeable companion.
She was indefatigable in seeing the celebrated
places from every point, and made excursions which
the gouty feet of her father, or the etiquette of a stranger's
attendance would have forbidden. In these cases
Frank's company was evidently a convenience; and
over hill and dale, through glen and cavern, he had
borne her delicate arm by the precious privilege of
cousinship.

There's nothing like a cousin. It is the sweetest relation
in human nature. There is no excitement in
loving your sister, and courting a lady in the face of a
strange family requires the nerve of a martyr; but your
dear familiar cousin, with her provoking maidenly reserve,
and her bewitching freedoms, and the romping
frolics, and the stolen tenderness over the skein of silk
that will get tangled—and then the long rides which nobody
talks about, and the long tête-à-têtes which are nobody's
business, and the long letters of which nobody
pays the postage—no, there is nothing like a cousin—
a young, gay, beautiful witch of a cousin!

Till within a few days Frank had enjoyed a monopoly
of the lady Viola's condescensions; but their party
had been increased lately by a young gentleman who
introduced himself to papa as the son of an old friend,
and proceeded immediately to a degree of especial attention
which relieved our hero exceedingly of his duties.

Mr Erastus Van Pelt was a tall, thin person with an
aquiline nose, and a forehead that retreated till it was
lost in the distance. It was evident at the first glance
that he was high ton. The authenticity of his style,
even on board a steam boat, distanced imitation immeasurably.
The angle of his bow had been an insoluble
problem from his début at the dancing school till the
present moment, and his quizzing glass was thrown up
to his eye with a grace that would have put Brummel to
the blush. From the square toe of his pump to the loop
of his gold chain he was a perfect wonder. Every body
smiled on Mr Erastus Van Pelt.

This accomplished gentleman looked with an evil eye
on our hero. He had the magnanimity not to cut him
outright, as he was the lady's cousin; but tolerated him
on the first day with a cold civility, which he intended
should amount to a cut on the second. Frank thought
him thus far very amusing; but when he came frequently
in the way of his attentions to his cousin, and once or
twice raised his glass at his remarks, with the uncomprehending
`Sir!' he was observed to stroke his black
whiskers with a very ominous impatience. Further acquaintance
by no means mended the matter, and Frank's
brow grew more and more cloudy. He had already
alarmed Mr Van Pelt with a glance of his eye that
could not be mistaken, and anticipated his `cut direct'
by at least some hours, when the lady Viola took
him aside and bound over his thumb and finger to keep
the peace toward the invisible waist of his adversary.

A morning or two after this precaution, the boat was
bending in toward a small village which terminates the
safe navigation above the rapids of the Split Rock.
Coaches were waiting on shore, to convey passengers to
the next still water, and the mixed population of the little
village, attracted by the arrival, was gathered in a
picturesque group on the landing. There was the Italian
looking Canadian with his clear olive complexion
and open neck, his hat slouched carelessly, and the
indispensable red sash hanging from his waist; and the
still, statue like Indian with the incongruous blanket
and belt, hat and moccasin costume of the border,
and the tall, inquisitive looking Vermontese—all mingled
together like the figures of a painter's study.

Miss Clay sat on the deck, surrounded by her party.
Frank, at a little distance, stood looking into the water
with the grave intentness of a statue, and Mr Van Pelt
levelled his glass at the `horrid creatures' on shore, and
expressed his elegant abhorrence of their savaugerie in
a fine spun falsetto. As its last thin tone melted, he
turned and spoke to the lady with an air evidently more
familiar than her dignity for the few first days seemed to
have warranted. There was an expression of ill concealed
triumph in his look, and an uncompromised turning
of his back on our penseroso, which indicated an advance
in relative importance; and though Miss Clay
went on with the destruction of her card of distances
just as if there was nobody in the world but herself, the
conversation was well sustained till the last musical superlative
was curtailed by the whiz of the escape valve.

As the boat touched the pier, Frank awoke from his
reverie, and announced his intention of taking a boat
down the rapids. Viola objected to it at first as a dangerous
experiment; but when assured by him that it
was perfectly safe, and that the boat, during the whole

passage, would be visible from the coach, she opposed
it no further. Frank then turned to Mr Van Pelt, and
to her astonishment, politely requested his company.
The dandy was thunderstruck. To his comprehension
it was like offering him a private interview with a bear.
`No, sir,' said he, with a nervous twirl of his glass
round his forefinger. Miss Clay, however, insisted on
his acceptance of the invitation. The prospect of his
company without the restraint of Frank's presence, and
a wish to foster the good feeling from which she thought
the offer proceeded, were sufficient reasons for perseverance,
and on the ground that his beautiful cap was
indispensable to the picturesque effect, she would take
no denial. Most reluctantly his consent was at last
given, and Frank sprang on shore with an accommodating
readiness to find boatmen for the enterprise.

He found his errand a difficult one. The water was
uncommonly low, and at such times the rapids are
seldom passed, even by the most daring. The old
voyageurs received his proposition with shrugs and
volumes of patois, in which he could only distinguish
adjectives of terror. By promises of extravagant remuneration,
however, he prevailed on four athletic Canadians
to row him to Coteau du Lac. He then took
them aside, and by dint of gesture and bad French,
made them comprehend, that he wished to throw his
companion into the river. They had no shadow of
objection. For a `consideration,' they would upset the
bateau in a convenient place below the rapids, and
ensure Mr Van Pelt's subsequent existence at the forfeiture
of the reward. A simultaneous `Gardez vous!'
was to be the signal for action.

The coaches had already started when Frank again
stood on the pier, and were pursuing slowly the beautiful
road on the bank of the river. He almost repented

his rash determination for a moment, but the succeeding
thought was one of pride, and he sprang lightly into the
bateau at the `Allons!' of the impatient boatmen.

Mr Van Pelt was already seated, and as they darted
rapidly away with the first stroke of the oars, the
voyageur at the helm commenced a low recitative. At
every alternate line, the others joined in a loud, but not
inharmonious chorus, and the strokes were light or deep
as the leader indicated, by his tone, the necessity of
rapidity or deliberation. In a few minutes they reached
the tide, and as the boat swept violently in, the oars
were shipped, and the boatmen, crossing themselves and
mumbling a prayer to the saint, sat still, and looked
anxiously forward. It was evidently much worse than
Mr Van Pelt had anticipated. Frank remarked upon
the natural beauties of the river, but he had no eye for
scenery. He sat on a low seat, grasping the sides of the
boat with a tenacity as unphilosophical as it was out of
character for his delicate fingers. The bateau glided
like a bird round the island which divides the river, and,
steering for the middle of the stream, was in a moment,
hurrying with its whole velocity onward. The Split
Rock was as yet far below, but the intermediate distance
was a succession of rapids, and, though not much
dreaded by those accustomed to the navigation, they
were to a stranger sufficiently appalling. The river was
tossed like a stormy sea, and the large waves, thrown
up from the sunken rocks, came rolling back upon the
tide, and, dashing over the boat, flung her off like a
tiny shell. Mr Van Pelt was in a profuse perspiration.
His knees, drawn up to his head by the acute angle of
his posture, knocked violently together, and no persuasion
could induce him to sit in the depressed stern for
the accommodation of the voyageurs. He sat right in
the centre of the bateau, and kept his eye on the waves

with a manifest distrust of Providence, and an anxiety
that betrayed a culpable want of resignation.

The bateau passed the travellers on shore as she
neared the rock. Frank waved his handkerchief triumphantly.
The water just ahead roared and leaped up
in white masses like a thousand monsters; and, at the
first violent whirl, he was pulled down by a voyageur,
and commanded imperatively to lie still. Another and
another shock followed in quick succession, and she
was perfectly unmanageable. The helmsman threw
himself flat on the bottom. Mr Van Pelt hid his face
in his hands, and crouched beside him. The water
dashed in, and the bateau, obeying every impulse,
whirled and flung from side to side like a feather. It
seemed as if every plunge must be the last. One moment
she shivered and stood motionless, struck back by
a violent blow, and the next, shot down into an abyss
with an arrowy velocity that seemed like instant destruction.
Frank shook off the grasp of the voyageur, and,
holding on to the side, half rose to his feet. `Gardez
vous!' exclaimed the voyageur; and, mistaking the
caution for the signal, with a sudden effort he seized
Mr Van Pelt, and, plunging him over the side, leaped
in after him. `Diable!' muttered the helmsman, as the
dandy, with a piercing shriek, sprang half out of water,
and disappeared instantly. But the Split Rock was right
beneath the bow, and like a shot arrow the boat sprang
through the gorge, and in a moment was gliding among
the masses of foam in the smooth water.

They put back immediately, and at a stroke or two
against the current, up came the scientific `brutus' of
Mr Van Pelt, quite out of curl, and crested with the
foam through which he had emerged to a thinner element.
There was no mistaking its identity, and it was rudely
seized by the voyageur with a tolerable certainty that

the ordinary sequel would follow. All reasoning upon
anomalies, however, is uncertain, and to the terror of
the unlettered captor, down went un gentilhomme, leaving
the envy of the world in his possession. He soon reappeared,
and with his faith in the unity of Monsieur
considerably shaken, the voyageur lifted him carefully
into the bateau.

My dear reader! were you ever sick? Did you have a
sweet cousin, or a young aunt, or any pretty friend who
was not your sister or your mother, for a nurse? And
do you remember how like an angel's fingers, her small
white hand laid on your forehead, and how thrillingly her
soft voice spoke low in your ear, and how inquiringly
her fair face hung over your pillow? If you have not,
and remember no such passages, it were worth half
your sound constitution, and half your uninteresting
health, and half your long life, to have had that experience.
Talk of moonlight in a bower, and poetry in
a boudoir—there is no atmosphere for love like a sick
chamber, and no poetry like the persuasion to your
gruel, or the sympathy for your aching head, or your
feverish forehead.

Three months after Frank Gresham was taken out of
the St Lawrence, he was sitting in a deep recess with
the lady, who, to the astonishment of the whole world,
had accepted him as her lover.

`Miss Viola Clay,' said our hero with a look of profound
resignation, `when will it please you to attend to
certain responses you wot of?'

The answer was in a low sweet tone, inaudible to all
save the ear for which it was intended.

THE NOTES OF OUR BIRDS.

BY I. M'LELLAN.

MERE ACCIDENT.

BY N. P. WILLIS.

VERMONT.

`This is a strange world,' said a friend, laying down
the Token. `Your remark is more true than original,'
I replied. `The mass of moving and intelligent beings
who compose the world are strange enough, no doubt.
The world, of itself—I mean this planet on which we
dwell—is most beautiful and perfect; but the word has
many different meanings. To the fashionable, Washington,
New York, and Saratoga, are the world; and provided
that is not quite large enough, fashion makes the
world extend to Niagara, and down the St Lawrence.
Sometimes a man's home is his world, and occasionally
the world is his home; and sometimes, too, there may
be a poor wretch who has no home in the world.'

`I care not for your explanations and definitions,'
said my friend; `here is a work professing to be purely
American—and there are many others—and yet there is
no end to the slanders which are cast upon one of the
New England States. Is a place out of the world,
that is, out of all worlds—it is sure to be in Vermont.

Does a man four feet broad and seven feet high appear
in the “Bay State”—he is said to be “from Vermont.”
“Ah yes! from Vermont,” lisps a dandy, four feet and
three inches in length; “quite a promising young man.”
Is a student awkward, ungainly, and unmannerly—“You
would think,” say his fellow students, “he came from
Vermont.” Does a young Vermonter gaze with rapture
upon a fine landscape—“No wonder,” is the exclamation,
“he never saw anything but pine trees before.”
Does he dwell with still more intense admiration on the
fair face of beauty—“Why, he is only enchanted by the
novelty of a white forehead and red cheek; everybody
knows the faces of Vermont girls are the color of a
Swedish turnip.” Has a woman a great ancle—“She
is a native of Vermont—a small town,” says a reigning
belle, “on Lake Superior. I have always understood
lake air was injurious. When my father and I went
there, I persuaded him to entrust his affairs to an agent,
and hurry away as fast as possible; for I believe my
foot and ancle increased the third part of an inch the
two days we were obliged to remain in that out of the
way place.”—“My son is very unfortunate,” sighs an
elderly lady;—“I have been very much distressed on
his account.” “Has anything in particular happened,
madam, to cause so much anxiety? Allow me to hope
it may be in my power to relieve you.” Still the lady
sobbed and wrung her hands, and, as I gathered in the
intervals of her sorrow, her son lived in Vermont!
Poor young man! doomed by the necessities of business,
and the sad prospect of making a large fortune, to
reside in a State where there is nothing but bears
and pumpkins! She felt for him sincerely—deeply—
nothing but a wilderness—no society, except here and
there a family in a log house! This young man, however,
finds his property increasing, and his prospects
good in every respect. He engages himself to a lovely
girl; and when he speaks of the time when her dignity
and virtues will grace his quiet home—“Impossible!”
she replies; “would you expose me to all the trials and
dangers of a life in Vermont?” He reasons and expostulates
to no effect; and then, in the plenitude of
his wisdom, removes to the city, because his wife cannot
live in Vermont! “Poor Mary!” exclaim her
friends, “she has been used to comforts and delicacies,
and it would not be right to deprive her of them.” And
so he lays down his independence and his good judgment,
at the shrine of a woman's whim.

`In faith I desire no worse punishment, than to be the
owner of such rich tracts of country as this State presents—fertile,
cultivated, and most romantic. I would
sooner be a dweller in some of its towns bordering on the
Connecticut, or those rich vallies that bound its western
frontier, than to revel in all the luxuries which belong to
the most boasted cities. There is no higher enjoyment,
which is connected with anything earthly, than to
watch the changing beauty of its landscapes. Many
are the hours I have stood upon yonder eminence, and
marked the beams of the descending sun upon the
plains, the river, and its villages, gradually shadowing
the hills, till the topmost boughs of the tall fir trees were
the only objects which received its parting glory. That
passed away, and the light mist curled upon its brow,
flinging its fantastic wreaths over tree and rock, till it
reposed in one dense mass upon mountain and plain.
Then the moon arose, and shone upon this moving lake,
till it seemed to smile and dimple in its clear beauty.'

`Upon my word!' I exclaimed, `here is a description,
and from you!' `From me? Am I not a native of
Vermont, and have not my fathers long dwelt here?
They were honorable and wise, and it is the sarcastic

smile which plays upon the lip, when my State is mentioned,
which rouses my pride. “Oh! nobody knows
where—up in Vermont!”' `But you should remember
such sarcasms are from the ignorant.' `A very just
remark! Everybody is ignorant when Vermont is
mentioned.' `Pardon me,' I replied, `for again alluding
to the subject. You have convinced me there is fine
scenery in your State, but I have heard nothing with
regard to your men and women.' `As it respects the
former,' my friend replied with a serious air, `I cannot
perhaps be a correct judge. Many years since there was
a circle of gentlemen, whose united worth, talents, and
graceful address, made them the delight of a much more
extended circle than their own; and who are remembered,
for but few of them remain, as constituting a
school of wisdom and politeness, now comparatively forgotten.
They were thrown together in times of public
excitement, and their actions and writings remain, to
prove their patriotism and genius. I have often wished,'
he added, `that their lives and private virtues were
made the subject of something more than a passing notice.
At present many of our young men seek distant
States, for the display of talent, or the acquirement of
wealth; but it may be truly said of those who remain,
that no section of our country can boast of a class of
men of purer morals or better energies. The claims of
hospitality are understood in every grade of society;
and I am well assured, if there is a reading and thinking
population in any part of America, that population
is to be found in the slandered State of Vermont.' `But
the ancles of her ladies—surely you have not come to
a conclusion, with this part of the argument untouched?'
`As to that,' said my friend, `there is proportion in the
character and persons of my fair State's women; and
proportion is beauty.'

THE NUN.

BY EMMA C. MANLY.

ROMANCE IN REAL LIFE.

BY THE AUTHOR OF `REDWOOD.'

Many fortunate travellers on the western border of
Massachusetts, and not many miles from the Hudson,
have been refreshed at the inn of Reliance Reynolds.
Reliance, as his name indicates, was born in the good
old times. We are aware that the enthusiasts about the
`progress of the age,' deny this golden period any but a
retrospective existence, and maintain that, retrace the
steps of the human family far as you will, it is like the
age of chivalry, always a little behind you. But we adhere
to the popular phraseolgy and call those, `good old
times,' when the Puritanical nomenclature prevailed;
when such modest graces as faith and temperance had
not been expelled from our taverns, kitchens, and workshops,
by the heroes and heroines of romance—the Orlandos
and Lorenzos, Rosamonds and Anna Matildas.

Reliance belonged to the `good old times,' too, in the
more essential matter of downright honesty, simplicity,
and respectful courtesy. His was a rare character in
New England—a passive spirit, content to fill and fit the
niche nature had prepared for him. It was not very high,

but he never aspired above it; nor very low, but he never
sank below it. He was the marvel of his neighbours,
for he could never be persuaded into an enterprise, or
speculation. He never bought a water privilege, nor
an oar bed; subscribed to a county bank, or `moved to
the West;' or in any mode indicated that principle in
man, which, in its humble operations, is restlessness, in
its lofty aspirations, a longing after immortality. Reliance's
desires never passed the bounds of his premises,
and were satisfied, even within them, with a very moderate
share of power. He stood at his door, his hat in
his hand, to receive his guests; he strictly performed
the promise of his sign, and gave `good entertainment
to man and horse;' he rendered a moderate bill and received
his dues with a complacent smile, in which gratitude
was properly tempered with a just sense of his own
rights. In short, as must be already quite manifest,
Reliance, though a pattern landlord, is a very poor
subject for a storyteller; his qualities, like the colors
in a ray of light, all blending and forming one hue, and
his life, presenting the same monotonous harmony.

We should not have forced him from his happy obscurity
into the small degree of notoriety he may incur
on our humble page, but for his being the adjunct of his
wife, an important personage in our narrative.

Mrs Reynolds, too, like her husband, performed exactly
the duties of her station. She never perhaps read
a line of poetry, save such as might lurk in the `Poet's
Corner' of a village paper, but her whole life was an illustration
of the oldfashioned couplet—

She never was presidentess of a `society for ameliorating
the condition of the Jews,' or secretary or treasurer
of any of those beneficent associations that rescue the
latent talents of women from obscurity and mettrent en
scéne gems and flowers that might otherwise shine and
exhale unnoticed and unknown; but though humble
was her name and destiny, her memory is dear to the
wayfaring. Quiet, order, and neatness, reigned at her
bed and board. No pirates harbored in her bedsteads,
no bad luck, that evil genius of housewives, curdled her
cream, spoiled her butter or her bread, but her table
was spread with such simple, wholesome fare as might
have lit a smile on the wan visage of an old dispeptic;
and this we take to be the greatest achievement of the
gastronomic art.

With the duties of life so peacefully and so well performed,
our good hostess ought, according to all the
rules of happiness, to have been happy; but it is our
melancholy duty to confess she was not, and to explain
the cause. She had been married many years without
having any children; that blessed possession that in
transmitting, the parents' existence, seems to extend its
bounds, and to render even here, the mortal immortal.
In addition to the feeling, common to all women, who
naturally crave the sweetest objects for their tenderest
and strongest affections, Mrs Reynolds lamented
her childless state with a bitterness of repining approaching
to that of the Hebrew wives. With everything
else in her possession that could inspire contentment, her
mind was fixed on this one desired good, and, like Hannah
of old, she was still a `woman of a sorrowful spirit.'
She had endeavoured to solace herself with the children
of her kindred, and several, from time to time, had been
adopted into her family; but some proved disagreeable,
and others homesick, and there was always a paramount
duty or affection that interfered with her's, till finally her

almost extinguished hopes were gratified, and Providence
gave her a child worthy all her care and love.[3]

In the autumn of 1777, two travellers arrived just
at nightfall at Reynold's inn. Its aspect was inviting;
situated in the heart of a fertile valley that had lately
been refreshed by the early rains of autumn, and in its
bright garb resembling a mature beauty that had happily
harmonized some youthful tints with her soberer graces.
A sprightly, winding stream gave life and music to
the meadows. On every side the landscape was undulating
and fertile, but not then as extensively cultivated as
now, when, to the Tauconnuc on the south, and the lofty
blue outline of the Catskills on the west, the eye ranges
over a rich and enjoyed country. Beside the accidental
charm of a pretty landscape, the inn had advantages
peculiar to itself. Instead of being placed on
the roadside, as most of our taverns are—for what reason
we know not, unless a cloud of travellers' dust be typical
of a shower of gold to the vision of mine host—
Reynolds's inn was separated from the highway by a
court yard, shaded by two wide spreading elms, and enlivened
with a profusion of autumnal flowers, marigolds,
cockscombs, and china asters.

There was nothing that indicated any claims to particular
civility in the appearance of our travellers. They
were well looking and respectably apparelled; and, accordingly,
having announced their determination to remain

for the night, they were shown to an inner
room, the parlour, par excellence, where Mrs Reynolds appeared,
and having opened a door which admitted the
balmy air and a view of the western sky, just then brightened
by the tints of the setting sun, she received their
orders for their supper, and retired without one of those
remarks or inquiries by which it is usual, on such occasions
to give vent to curiosity. Nothing passed between
our travellers in the dull interval that elapsed before
their meal was ready, to give to our readers the
least clue to their origin or destiny. One of them lulled
himself into a doze in the rocking chair, while the other,
younger and more active and vivacious, amused himself
out of doors, plucking flowers, enraging an old petulant
cock turkey, and mocking the scolding of some Guinea
hens, the Xantippes of the feathered race.

The interval was not long. The door opened and the
tea table was brought in, already spread (a mode we
wish others would adopt from our pattern landlady),
and spread in a manner to characterize our bountiful
country.

What a contrast does the evening meal of our humblest
inn present to the leanness of an English tea table!
A cornucopia would have been the appropriate
symbol for Mrs Reynolds's table. There were beef steaks,
and ham and eggs; hot cakes and toast; bread and gingerbread;
all the indigenous cakes, such as crullers and
nutcakes, &c.; honey, sweetmeats, apple sauce, cheese,
pickles, and an afterpiece of pies. Kind reader, do not
condemn our bill of fare as impertinent and vulgar.
We put it down to show the scared political economists,
that, with us, instead of the population pressing on the
means of subsistence, the means of subsistence presses
on the population.

Our travellers fell to their repast with appetites
whetted by a long fast and a day's ride. Not a
word was spoken, till a little girl, who was sitting on
the doorstep caressing a tame pigeon, perceiving that
one of the guests had garnished his buttonhole with
a bunch of marigolds, plucked a rose from a monthly
rose bush, trained over a trellis at the door, and laid it
beside his plate. He seemed struck with the modest
offering, and, turning with a look of gratitude to the
child, he patted her on her head, and exclaimed instinctively,
`Merci, merci, ma pelite!' and then correcting
himself, he said, in very imperfect English, `I
thank you, my little girl.'

The child's attention was fixed by the first word he
uttered, and as he addressed his companion in French,
her countenance indicated more emotion than would naturally
have been excited by the simple circumstance of
hearing, for the first time, a foreign language. `Qu'elle
est belle, cette petite,' he continued, turning to his companion;
`c'est la beauté de mon pays—voilà, brunette, et les
yeux, si grands, si noirs, et la tournure aussi—quelle grâce,
quelle vivacilé! Ah! Monsieur, Monsieur, c'est tout-à-fait
Françoise.' As he proceeded the child advanced
nearer to him. She shook back the rich, dark curls
that shaded her face, bent her head forward, half parted
her bright lips, and listened with the uncertain and
eager expression of one who is catching a half remembered
tune, the key to a thousand awakening recollections.
It was evident that she did not comprehend
the purport of the words, and that it was the sound
alone to which her delighted ear was stretched.

A smile played about her lips, and tears gathered in
her eyes, and there seemed to be a contrariety of emotions,
confounding even to herself; but that which finally
prevailed was indicated by her throwing her apron over

her head, and retreating to the doorstep, where she sat
down, and for some moments, vainly attempted to stifle
her sobs. She had just become tranquil, when Mrs
Reynolds entered.

The elder traveller said, in an interrogating tone,
`That is your child, ma'am?.'

`I call her mine,' was the brief and not very satisfactory
reply.

`She resembles neither you nor your husband,' resumed
the traveller.

`No; she does not favor us.'

`I fancied she had a French look.'

`I can't say as to that,' replied the landlady; `I
never saw any French people.'

`My friend here is a Frenchman,' pursued the traveller,
`and the little girl listened to him so intently, that
I thought it possible she might understand him.'

`No, I guess she did not sense him,' replied Mrs
Reynolds, with an air of indifference; and then turning
hastily to the child, `Mary,' she said, `there is more
company; go and see if your father does not want you.'

She went, and did not return. Mrs Reynolds herself
removed the table. The elder gentleman sat down to
write a letter; while the Frenchman walked to and fro,
opened the doors, and peeped in every direction to get
a glimpse of the little girl, who seemed to have taken
complete possession of his imagination. Once, as she
ran through the passage, he called to her, `Doucement!
doucement! mon petit ange'—she stopped as if she were
glued to the floor. `How call you your name, my dear?'

`Mary Reynolds, sir.'

`Then Madame there, Mistress Reynolds, is your
maman?'

`She is—

`Mary, what are you staying for? Here—this instant!'
screamed Mrs Reynolds from the kitchen door, in a tone
that admitted no delay, and the child ran off without
finishing her sentence.

`C'est bien singulier!' muttered the Frenchman.

`What do you find so singular, Jaubert?' asked his
companion, who had just finished his letter, and thrown
down his pen.

`Oh! it is nothing—perhaps—but—'

“`But” what, my friend?'

`Why, there seems to me some mystery about this
child; something in her manner, I know not what, that
stirs up strange thoughts and hopes in my mind. She
is not one of the pale, blond beauties of your climate.'

`Ah! my good friend, we have all sorts of beauties in
our clime. All nations, you know, have sent us their
contributions. The blue eye and fair skin, the Saxon
traits, certainly prevail in our Eastern States; but you
know we border on New York, the asylum of the dark
eyed Huguenots, and it is not impossible that to this
child may have been transmitted the peculiarities of
some French ancestor. Nothing is more common than
a resemblance between a descendant and a far off
progenitor.'

`Ah! it is not only the French, the Norman aspect,
the—do not ridicule me—the Angely traits that attract
me; but you yourself noticed how she listened to my
language, and then this Mistress Reynolds does not
say she is her child, but only she calls her so.'

`Pshaw! Is that all? It is the way of my country
people, Jaubert; their indirectness is proverbial. If
one of them were to say “yes” or “no,” you might
suspect some deep mystery. I confess I was at first
startled with the little girl's emotion, but I soon perceived
it was nothing but shame and embarrassment at

the curiosity she had betrayed. I see how it is, Jaubert;
fruitless and hopeless as is our search, you cannot bear
to relinquish it, and are looking for some coup de théâtre—
some sudden transition from disappointment to success.'

We have put into plain English a conversation that
was supported in French, and was now broken off by
the approach of Mrs Reynolds, who came to tell the
travellers their bedrooms were ready. By the light of
the candle she brought, she discovered Mary, concealed
in a corner of the passage close to the door, where, in
breathless stillness, she had been listening. `You here,
Mary!' exclaimed the good woman; `I thought you
had been in bed this half hour. You will make me
angry with you, Mary, if you do not mind me better
than this,' she added in an under tone, and the child
stole away, but without looking either very penitent or
very fearful; and in truth she had cause for neither
penitence nor fear, for she had only gratified an innocent
and almost irrepressible inclination, and as to
Dame Reynolds's anger, it was never formidable.

The travellers retired to their respective apartments,
and while the landlady lingered to adjust her parlour, the
letter that had been left on the table caught her eye.
Nothing could be more natural than for her to look at
the superscription. Painfully she spelt out the first
line. `A Monsieur, Monsieur'—but when she came to
the next, her eye was rivetted, `St Jean Angely de CrèveCœur.'
After gazing on it till she had made assurance
doubly sure, she was hastening to her husband to participate
the discovery with him, when, apparently changing
her intentions, she retreated, bolted the door, and
returned to the examination of the letter. It was unsealed.
Reluctant to open it, she compromised with
her conscience, and peeped in at both ends, but the
writing was not perceptible, and her interest overcoming

her scruples, she unfolded the letter. Alas! it was in
French. In vain her eye ran over the manuscript to
catch some words that might serve as clues to the rest.
There was nothing in all the three pages she could
comprehend, but `arrivé à New York'—`la rivière d'
Hudson'—`le manoir de Livingston.'

She was refolding the letter, when the following
postscript, inadvertently written in English, caught her
eye; `As we have no encouragement to proceed farther
in our search, and Jean and Avenel are all impatience,
Jaubert will embark in the Neptune, which is to sail on
the first.'

A gleam of pleasure shot across Mrs Reynolds's face,
but it soon darkened again with anxiety and perplexity.
`Why did I open the letter?' she asked herself. `Why
did I look at it at all? But nobody will ever know that
I have seen it unless I tell it myself; and why should I
tell?' A burst of tears concluded this mental interrogation,
and proved that, however earnestly her heart
might plead before the tribunal of conscience, yet the
stern decision of that unerring judge was heard. Self-interest
has a hard task when it would mystify the path
of one who habitually walks by the clear light of truth
straight onward in the path of duty.

It may seem unnatural to the inexperienced, that
Mrs Reynolds did not communicate her embarrassment
and irresolution, from whatever cause they proceeded,
to her husband; but she well knew what would be the
result of a consultation; for he, good man, never viewed
a subject but from one position, and we are all slow to
ask advice that we foresee will be counter to our wishes.

Mrs Reynolds, so far then from appealing to the constituted
authority of her household, locked her discovery
within her own bosom, and, to avoid all suspicion and
inquiry, she composed herself as soon as possible, and

retired to her bed, but not to sleep; and at peep of dawn,
she was up and prepared to obtain all the satisfaction
that indirect interrogation could procure from the travellers,
and her mental resolution, invigorated by a night's
solitary reflection, was `to act up to her light.'

They had ordered breakfast at a very early hour, and
she took care to be the only person in attendance on
them. When they were seated at table, she placed
herself in a rocking chair behind them, a position that
happily reconciles the necessity of service with the
dignity of independence, and began her meditated approaches,
by saying to her own countryman, `I believe
you left a letter here last night, sir; I laid it in the cupboard
for fear of accidents.'

`Thank you, ma'am; I ought to have been more
careful. It was a letter of some consequence.'

`Indeed! Well, I was thinking it might be.'

`Ah! what made you think so?'

Now we must premise, that neither of the parties
speaking, knew anything of that sensitiveness that starts
from a question as if an attack were made on private
property; but they possessed, in common, the good-natured
communicativeness that is said to characterize
the New England people, who, in their colloquial traffic,
as in other barter, hold exchange to be no robbery.

Most women are born diplomatists, and Mrs Reynolds
took care to reply to the last interrogatory so carefully
as not to commit herself. `It stands to reason,' she
said, `a letter that is to go all the way over the wide
sea to the old countries, should be of consequence.'

`Yes—it is a long voyage.'

`You have taken it yourself, perhaps, sir?'

`I have. I went out an officer on board one of our
cruisers, and was wrecked on the coast of France.'

`Of France! Well, we are hand and glove with the
French now; but I tell my husband it seems to me like
joining with our enemies against those of our own
household.'

`Ah! Mrs Reynolds, “friends are sometimes better
than kindred.” I am sure my own father's son could
not have been kinder to me than was Monsieur Angely
de Crève-Cœur—hey, Jaubert?'

`Ah! vraiment, Monsieur! c'est un bien brave homme,
Monsieur St Jean Angely.'

`Angely!' said Mrs Reynolds, as if recalling some
faded recollection, `Angely—I think I have heard that
name before.'

`It may be. The gentleman I speak of resided
some time in this country.'

`But it can't be the same,' replied Mrs Reynolds;
`for the person I speak of lived over in Livingston's
manner; and kind to strangers he could not be, for he
deserted his own flesh and blood, and went off early in
the war.'

`It may be the same for all that, and must be. As
to his deserting his children, “thereby hangs a tale;”
but it is a long one.'

`Well, sir, if you have anything to say in his favor,
I am bold to say I think you ought to speak it; especially
as the gentleman seems to have stood your friend
in a cloudy day. The story certainly went sadly against
him here.'

`I have not the slightest objection, ma'am, to telling
the story, if you have the patience to hear it; especially
as I see I must wait till Jaubert has finished two more
of your nice fresh eggs—“eggs of an hour,” Mrs
Reynolds.'

`We always calculate to have fresh eggs, sir. But
what was you going to say of Mr Angely?' she added,

betraying, in the tremulous tones of her voice, some
emotion more heart stirring than curiosity. Jaubert
turned a glance of inquiry on her that was answered by
a sudden rush of blood to her cheeks; but the narrator
proceeded without noticing anything extraordinary.
`It was my good, or ill luck,' he said,—`and it is only
in the long run we can tell whether luck be good or ill—
but it was my luck to be shipwrecked on the coast of
Normandy, and good luck it certainly was, Jaubert, in
my distress, to make such a port as the Château de
Crève-Cœur—the castle, or, as we should call it here,
Mrs Reynolds, the estate of the Angely's. A fine family
they are. You may think what a pleasure it was to
me to find a gentleman acquainted with my country,
and speaking my language as did Mr St Jean Angely.
He was kind and affable to me, and always doing something
for my pleasure, but I could see he had a heaviness
at his heart—that he was often talking of one thing
and thinking of another—nothing like so gay as the
old gentleman, his father; who was like a fall flower—
one of your marigolds, Mrs Reynolds, spreading itself
open to every ray of sunshine, as if there were no frosts
and winter and death at hand. I felt a pity for the
young man. With everything that heart could desire,
and without a heart to enjoy, he seemed to me like a
sick man seated at a feast of which he could not taste.
The day before I was to have come away, he took me
aside, and, after saying that I had won his entire confidence,
he disclosed to me the following particulars:—

`He entered the French army early in life, and while
yet a hotblooded, inconsiderate youth, he killed a brother
officer in a duel, and was obliged to fly his country.
He took refuge in Lisbon. Judgment, I may say mercy,
too—in the dealings of Providence, Mrs Reynolds,
one is always close on the track of the other—followed

him thither. Mr Angely found employment in a mercantile
house, and was standing writing at his desk at
the moment of the terrible earthquake that laid Lisbon
in ruins. The timbers of the house in which he was,
were pitched in such a manner as to form a sort of arch
over his head, on which the falling roof was sustained,
and thus he was, as it were, miraculously delivered
from danger. From Lisbon he came to this country.
“Mechanics,” says a Spanish proverb, “make the best
pilgrims,” but, I am sure, not better than Frenchmen;
for cast them where you will, they will get an honest
living. Mr Angely came up into Livingston's Manor,
and there he took a fancy to a pretty Yankee girl, the
only child of a widow, and married her. He earned a
subsistence for his family by surveying. The country
was new, and skilful surveyors scarce. After a few
years his wife died and left him three children.'

`Three!' repeated Mrs Reynolds, involuntarily sighing.

`Yes, poor things! there were three of them; too many
to be left in these hard times fatherless and motherless.'

`Ah sir! and what must we think of the father that
could forsake his little children at such a time?'

`Think no evil, my friend; for Mr Angely did not
deserve it. He was employed by Mrs Livingston, early
in the war, to go down the river to survey some land
near New York. There he was taken by the British
as a spy, and, in spite of his remonstrances, sent to
England. This was before the French had taken part
with us, and he obtained leave to go to France, on giving
his parole that he would not return to America.
He received a parent's welcome, and the affair of the
duel being nearly forgotten, a pardon was obtained for
him without difficulty. If he could have forgotten his
children, he would have been as happy as man could

be; but his anxiety for them preyed on his health and
spirits; and when I arrived at the château, his friends
imagined he was sinking under some unknown disease.
He had not communicated to his father the fact of his
marriage and the existence of his children when I arrived
there. The old gentleman, kind hearted and reasonable
in the main, has all the prejudices of the nobility
in the old countries about birth, and his son was
afraid to confess, that he had smuggled an ignoble little
Yankee into the ancient family of the Crève-Cœurs.
So good an opportunity as I afforded of communicating
with his children, could not be passed by, and he at
length summoned courage to tell the truth to his father.
At first he was wroth enough, and stormed and vapored;
but after a little while his kind nature got the mastery of
the blood of the Crève-Cœurs, and he consented to the
children being sent for—the boys, at least.'

`Only the boys!' exclaimed Mrs Reynolds, feeling
relieved from an insupportable weight.

`Only the boys. But the old gentleman might have
as well saved all his credit and sent for the girl too;
but that was not his pleasure. Well, Monsieur Jaubert
here, a relative and particular friend of the family,
came out with me to take charge of the children. We
found the boys without much difficulty; two noble
little fellows that a king might be proud of. After
waiting for some time for Monsieur Angely's return, the
overseers of the poor, believing he had abandoned his
children, bound them out. The little girl had been
removed to some distance from her brothers. We found
the place where she had been, but not the family. The
husband and wife had quarrelled, and separated, and disappeared;
and all the information we could obtain, was
a vague story that such a child had lived there and had
run away; and as nobody in these troublesome times

can do more than look after their own children, this
poor thing was left to her fate. Hopeless as it appears,
Jaubert is not willing to give up our search. He fancies
every brunette he sees is the lost Marie, and only last
evening he would have persuaded me, that your black
eyed little girl might be this stray scion of the CrèveCœurs.'

Mrs Reynolds rose and left the room, and did not
return till she was sufficiently composed to ask, in an
assured voice, `What was their object in looking for the
girl, if the father did not mean to reclaim her?'

`He did mean to reclaim and provide for her,' replied
the traveller, `and for that purpose I have ample funds
in my hands. He only conceded to the old gentleman
her remaining in the country for the present.'

`Had you any direction as to how you were to dispose
of her?'

`Yes, positive orders to convey her to Boston, and
place her under the guardianship of a French lady who
resides there, a friend of Mr Angely—one Madame
Adelon.'

`But could you find no trace of the child?'

`Not the slightest.'

`And you have determined to make no farther inquiry?'

`Why should we? Inquiry is useless, and would but
delay to a tempestuous season, Jaubert's return with
the boys.'

Our readers are doubtless sufficiently aware, that the
adopted child of our good landlady was the missing child
of Monsieur Angely. A few words will be necessary
to explain how she became possessed of her.

Mrs Reynolds and her husband were, two years prior
to this period, approaching the close of a winter day's
ride. Their sleigh was gliding noiselessly through a dry,
new fallen snow, when their attention was arrested by

the moanings of a child. To stop the horses and search
for the sufferer from whom the sounds proceeded, was
the instinctive impulse of benevolence. They had not
gone many yards from the road, when, nestled close to
a rock, and in some measure defended from the cold by
a clump of laurels, they found a little girl, her hands and
feet frozen, and nearly insensible. They immediately
carried her to the sleigh, and put their horses to their
utmost speed; but, as they were none of the fleetest,
and the nearest habitation was at several miles distance,
a considerable time elapsed before they could obtain the
means of restoration, and in consequence of this delay,
and of severe previous suffering, it was many weeks
before the child recovered. In the mean time, though
Mrs Reynolds's residence was not more than thirty
miles from the place where she had found the child, no
inquiry was made for her. The account she gave of
herself sufficiently explained this neglect. She said she
had no mother; that her father had left home just after
the snows melted and the birds came back; that he had
left her and her two brothers, Jean and Avenel, with a
woman to take care of them; that when this woman
had waited a great while for their father, she grew tired
and was cross to them, and then she too went away, and
left them quite alone. Then she said they had nothing
to eat, and she supposed they were the poor, for the
men they called the overseers of the poor took her and
her brothers, and separated them, and she was carried
a great way off to a woman who was very cross to her,
and cross to her own children, and her husband was
cross too. One night he came home in a great passion,
and he began to whip his wife with his big whip, and his
wife beat him with the hot shovel, and she, the child,
was scared, ran out of the house, and far up into a wood,
to get beyond their cries; and when she would have
returned, the snow was falling, and she could not find
the path, and she had wandered about till she was so
cold and tired she could go no farther. Her name,
she said, was Angely, and she believed her father was
called a Frenchman. The only parental relic she
possessed confirmed this statement. It was a locket
which she wore suspended at her neck. It contained a
lock of hair; an armorial crest was engraven on the
back, and under it was inscribed, `St Jean Angely de
Crève-Cœur.' This simple story established the conviction,
that had been gaining strength in Mrs Reynolds's
mind, with every day's attendance on the interesting
child, that they had been brought together by the special
providence of God; and most faithfully did she discharge
the maternal duties that she believed had been
thus miraculously imposed on her. The little girl was
on her part happy and delighted, and though she sometimes
bitterly lamented her father and brothers, yet, as
the impressions of childhood are slight, the recollection
of them was almost effaced when the mysterious energies
of memory were awakened by the sound of a language
that seemed to have been utterly forgotten. These
events occurred during the revolutionary war, a period
of disaster and distress, when a very diligent search for
a friendless child was not likely to be made, and as no
inquiry ever reached Mrs Reynolds's ear, and as she
deemed the foundling an orphan, she had not hesitated
to appropriate her. Her name was changed from Marie
Angely to Mary Reynolds; and the good woman seemed
as secure and happy as any mother, save when she was
reminded of the imperfection of her title by the too
curious inquiries of travellers. On these occasions she
was apt to betray a little irritability, and to veil the truth
with a slight evasion, as in the instance which excited
the suspicion of our sagacious Frenchman.

Her condition was now a pitiable one. She had the
tenderness, but not the rights of a parent. She was
habitually pure and upright; but now she was strongly
swayed by her affections. She would have persuaded
herself, that the abandonment in which she first found
the child, invested her with a paramount claim; but the
stranger's story had proved that her father had not
voluntarily abandoned her. Then she thought, `It cannot
be for Mary's interest, that I should give her up;'
and her mind took a rapid survey of the growing property
of which the child was the heir apparent. But she
would ask herself, `What do I know of the fortune of
her father?' `But surely he cannot, he cannot love
her as I do.' `Ah I do not know the feeling of a real
parent;' and a burst of tears expressed the sadness of
this conviction, and obliged her abruptly to withdraw
from the presence of her guests, and leave them amazed
at her sudden and violent emotion, while she retired to
her own apartment, to implore guidance and support
from Heaven. Those who honestly ask for light to point
out a way which they would fain not see, and for power
to endure a burden from which their nature shrinks, are
often themselves astonished at the illumination vouchsafed,
and the strength imparted. This was the experience
of Mrs Reynolds. She rose from her devotions
with the conviction, that but one course remained to her,
and with a degree of tranquillity, hastened to Mary's
bedroom.

The child was just risen and dressed. Without any
explanation to her—she was at the moment incapable
of making any—she tied her locket, her sole credential,
around her neck, led her down stairs, and placing her
hand in Jaubert's, she said, `You have found the child!'
and then retreated to hide the emotion she could not
subdue.

It was fortunate for her, that she was not compelled
to witness the gay demonstrations of Jaubert's ecstasies.
the graver, but not more equivocal manifestations of
his companion's satisfaction, and the amazement and
curiosity of the little girl, who was listening to the
explanation of the strangers, with childlike animation,
without adverting to her approaching separation from her
who had given her the affection and cares of a parent.

But when she came to be severed from this kind
friend, she made amends for her thoughtlessness. She
clung to her as if nature had knit the bonds that united
them, and, amid her cries and sobs, she promised always
to remember and love her as a mother. Many have
made such promises. Marie Angely kept them.

Ten years subsequent to the events above narrated,
a letter, of which the following is a translation, was
addressed by a foreigner in a high official station in
this country, to his friend.

He again closed the letter, and was for a moment
satisfied that there could be nothing in the nature of that
which he had so frankly communicated that required
concealment. He walked to the window and eyed the
little vessel as a miser looks at the casket that contains

his treasure; then starting from his reverie, he took
from his bosom a miniature, and contemplated it steadfastly
for a few moments; `It is my conscience that
reproaches me,' he said, `and not this serene, benign
countenance. O Emma! thou art equally incapable of
inflicting and resenting wrong, and shall thy trust and
gentleness be returned by even a transient treachery?
Am I so sure of faithfully keeping the citadel that I
may parley with an enemy?'

The result of this self-examination was a determination
to burn the letter, and to dismiss forever from his mind
the enchantress whose power had so swayed him from
his loyalty. But though he turned from the window,
resolutely closed the blind, and excluded the moonlight,
which he fancied influenced his imagination as if he
were a lunatic; though he went to bed and sunk into
oblivious sleep, the spirit was not laid. Imagination
revelled in its triumph over the will. He was in France,
in beautiful France—more beautiful now than in the
visions of memory and affection. He was at his remembered
haunts in his father's grounds; the `Lady of the
Guitar' was with him; she sang his favorite songs; he
saw her sparkling glance, her glowing cheek, her rich,
dark tints,

he heard the innocent childlike laugh, that,
Then there was interposed between him and this embodied
spirit of his joyous clime a slowly moving figure;
a cold, fair, pensive countenance, that had more of sorrow
than resentment, but still, though its reproach was
gentle, it was the reproach of the stern spectre of conscience.
He cast down his eyes, and they fell on the
word `BETROTHED,' traced in the sand at his feet. The
`Lady of the Guitar' was gaily advancing towards him.
Another step and her flowing mantle would have swept
over the word, and effaced it forever. He raised his
hand to deprecate her approach, and awoke; and while
the visions of sleep still confusedly mingled with the
recollections and resolutions of the preceding day, he
was up and at the window; had thrown open the blind
and ascertained that the vessel still lay becalmed in the
stream. That virtue is certainly to be envied, that does
not need to be shielded and fortified by opportunity and
circumstance. If the vessel had disappeared, the recollections
of the evening might have been as evanescent
and ineffectual as the dreams of the night; but there it
was, in fine relief, and as motionless as if it were encased
in the blue waters. In spite of M. Constant's excellent
resolutions, he lingered at the window, and returned
there as if he were spellbound. Strange power that
could rivet his eyes to an ill shapen little Dutch skipper!
But that body did contain a spirit, and that spirit, seemingly
as perturbed as his own, soon appeared, moving
with a light step to and fro on the deck.

The apartment M. Constant occupied, was furnished,
among other luxuries, with a fine spyglass. To resist
using this facility for closer communion was impossible;
and by its aid he could perceive every motion of the
`lady of his thoughts,' almost the changes of her countenance.
He saw she was gazing on the shore, and
that she turned eagerly to her companion to point her
attention to some object that had caught her eye, and
at the same moment he perceived it was his friend, who
was strolling on the shore. Ellison saw him too, and
waved his handkerchief in salutation. M. Constant
returned the greeting, threw down the glass, and withdrew

from the window with a feeling of compunction at
his indulgence, as if he had again heard that word
betrothed spoken. Why is it that external agents have
so much influence over the mysterious operations of
conscience? Why is it that its energy so often sleeps
while there is no witness to the wrong we commit?
`Keep thy heart, for out of it are the issues of life.'

After breakfast, Ellison said to M. Constant, `I am
afraid you find your masquerade dull. Let us beguile
the morning by a visit to your “Lady of the Guitar.”
There is nothing lends such wings to time as a pretty
girl. Our guests are a dull concern.'

`A dull concern, when there is a beauty and a fortune
among them!'

`Yes, a sated belle is to me as disagreeable as a
pampered child; as my grandmother's little pet Rosy,
whom I saw the other day, tossing away her sugar plums,
and crying “'T is not sweet enough;” and as to fortune,
though I am neither a philosopher nor a sentimentalist,
I shall never take the temple of Hymen in my way to
wealth; for of all speculations, a matrimonial speculation
seems to me the most hazardous, and the most disgraceful.
But we loiter. Will you pay your devoirs to our
unknown?'

`I believe not; I have letters to write this morning.'

`To Emma? Pardon me—I do not mean to pry into
your cabinet, but if the letters are to her they may be
deferred. She is a dear good soul and will find twenty
apologies for every fault you commit.'

`If they are to her, such generosity should not be
abused. No, I will not go. But on what pretext will you?'

`Pretext indeed! does a pilgrim seek for a pretext
to visit my Lady of Loretto, or the shrine of any other
saint? Here comes the gardener with a basket of fine
fruit which I have ordered to be prepared, and of which

I shall be the bearer to the sufferers pent in that dirty
sloop this breathless August morning—from mere philanthropy
you know. Commend me to Emma,' he added
gaily; `I will bear witness for you that your enthusiasm
for this unknown was a mere coup de la lune, and that
when daylight appeared you were as loyal, and—as
dull as a married man.'

Ellison's raillery did not render the bitter pill of self-denial
more palatable to M. Constant. He turned
away without reply, but instead of returning to his
apartment he obtained a gun, and inquiring the best direction
to pursue in quest of game, he sauntered into a
wooded defile that wound among the hills, and was so
enclosed by them as not to afford even a glimpse of the
river. Here he threw himself on the grass, took a
blank leaf from his pocketbook and began a sonnet to
constancy, but broke off in the middle; scribbled half
a dozen odd lines from the different songs that had entranced
him on the preceding evening; sketched a guitar,
then rose, and, still musing, pursued his way up the
defile. The path he had taken led him around the base
of an eminence to a rivulet that came frolicking down a
hill, now leaping, and now loitering with the capricious
humor of childhood. He traced it to its source, a
clear fountain bubbling up from the earth at the foot of
a high, precipitous rock. Clusters of purple and pink
wild flowers hung from the clefts of the rock, wreathing
its bare old front, and presenting a beautiful harmony in
contrast, like infancy and old age. The rock and the
sides of the fountain formed a little amphitheatre, enclosed
and deeply shaded by the mountain ash, the aromatic
hemlock and the lofty basswood. This sequestered
retreat, with its fresh aspect and sweet exhalations,
afforded a delicious refuge from the fierce heat and
overpowering light of an August day. M. Constant

was lingering to enjoy it when his ear caught the sound
of distant and animated voices. He started, and for a
moment thought himself cheated by the illusions of a
distempered fancy; but, as the sounds approached nearer,
he was assured of their reality, and they affected him
like the most painful discord, though they were produced
by the sweet, clear, penetrating voice of the unknown,
and the hitherto welcome tones of his friend.

The impropriety of a young girl straying off into such
a solitude with an acquaintance of an hour was obvious,
but was perhaps more shocking to M. Constant than
it would have been to a perfectly disinterested observer.
It gave a dreadful jar to his preconceived notions, and
contrasted, rudely enough, with the conduct of the preceding
night, when the lady had, with such scrupulous
delicacy, forborne to show herself on the deck of the
sloop. As they drew nearer he thought there was
something in the gay, familiar tones of Ellison, disgusting;
and the laugh of the lady, which before had seemed
the sweetest music of a youthful and innocent spirit, was
now harsh and hoydenish. The strain of their conversation,
too, for they were near enough to be heard distinctly,
while the windings of the path prevented his being
seen, though it was graceful chitchat enough, appeared
to him trifling and flippant in the extreme. As
they came still nearer he listened more intently, for he
had a personal interest in the subject.

`And so, my “Lady of the Guitar,”' said Ellison, `you
persist in preserving that scrap of paper, merely, I presume,
as a specimen of the sister arts of design and poetry.
You are sure those scratches are meant for
a guitar, and not a jewsharp, and that the fragment
is a sonnet and not a monody?'

`Certainly it is a sonnet; the poet says so himself.
See here—“Sonnet à la Constance.”'

`Well, it is certainly in the strain of a “lament.”
My friend was in a strait; what he would do he could
not. Constancy is a very pretty theme for a boarding-school
letter, but I am afraid the poor fellow will not
find his inspiration in this tame virtue?'

`Ah! these tame virtues, as you call them,' replied the
lady, `are the salutary food of life, while your themes
of inspiration are intoxicating draughts, violent and
transient in their effects.'

`A very sage lesson, and very well conned. Did your
grandmother teach it to you?'

`No matter—I have got it by heart.'

`O those moral New Englanders, they change all the
poetry of life to wise saws. Thank heaven you have
escaped from them in time to retain some portion of your
original mercurial nature. But now let me tell you, my
sage young friend, that same paper may prove as dangerous
where you are going as a match to a magazine.
So let me advise you, either keep it quite to yourself, or
give it to the winds.'

`You talk riddles, Mr Ellison; but I will not be quizzed
into believing this little castaway scrap of paper
can be of any import.'

`Let me label it for you then, if, as I see, it is to be filed
among the precious stores of your pocketbook.'

There was a short pause when the lady, as M. Constant
supposed, looking over Ellison's superscription,
read aloud, `Love's Labor Lost,' and then exclaimed,
`Pshaw, Robert, how absurd!' and tore off the offensive
label, while he laughed at her vexation.

M. Constant felt that it would be very embarrassing
for him to be discovered as a passive listener to this
coversation. He had been chained to the spot by an
interest that he would gladly not have felt, but which he
could not suppress.

Another turn would bring them directly before him.
To delay longer without being seen was therefore impossible.
As he put aside the rustling branches, he heard
Ellison exclaim, `Ha! there are some startled quails;'
but before his friend could take a more accurate observation,
he had sprung around an angle of the rock,
and was beyond sight and hearing.

The gentlemen met before dinner. M. Constant was
walking on the piazza, apparently moody and little disposed
to sympathize with Ellison's extravagant expressions
of admiration of the unknown, or of regret that the
fresh breeze was now wafting the vessel and its precious
cargo far away.

`In the name of Heaven, Constant,' he said, `what
has so suddenly turned you to ice? Last night you
seemed to think it necessary to invent—pardon me—allege
some apology for your prompt sensibility, and
you said it was not the beauty, the voice, the grace, or
any of the obvious and sufficient charms of this young
enchantress—that was your word—that fascinated you,
but it was a resemblance to the glowing beauties of
your own clime; and now, if you had been born at the
north pole and she at the equator, you could not manifest
less affinity.'

`There are certain principles,' replied M. Constant,
coldly, `that overcome natural affinities. I hope you
have passed your morning agreeably.'

`Agreeably? Delightfully! Our incognita is more
beautiful than you described her.'

`Is she then still incognita to you?' asked M. Constant
with a penetrating glance.

`Not exactly; she favored me with her name.'

`Her name! what is it?'

`Pardon me, I am under a prohibition not to tell.'

`The lady certainly makes marked distinctions. She
is as reserved towards others, as frank to you.'

`She had her reasons.'

`Doubtless; but what were they?'

`Why, one was that I refused to tell her your name.'

`And why did you that?'

`I had my reasons, too.'

M. Constant was vexed at the mystery his friend affected.
He was annoyed, too, at his perfect self complacency
and imperturbable good nature, and, more than
all, ashamed of his own irritability. He made an effort
to overcome it, and to put himself on a level with
Ellison. He succeeded so far in his efforts as to continue
to talk of the lady with apparent nonchalance till
he was summoned to dinner; but though he tried every
mode his ingenuity could devise, he could not draw
from his friend the slightest allusion to the lady's extraordinary
visit to the shore, or any particular of their interview,
which explained the perfect familiarity that
seemed to exist between them; and what made this
mystery more inscrutable, was the tone of enthusiasm
which Ellison maintained in speaking of the lady, and
which no young man sincerely feels without a sentiment
of respect.

In spite of M. Constant's virtuous resolutions and efforts,
the `Lady of the Guitar' continued to occupy his
imagination, and he determined to take the surest measures
to dispel an influence which he had in vain resisted.
As he parted from his friend at night, he announced his
intention of taking his departure the following morning.
After expressing his sincere regret, Ellison said, `You
go immediately to town?'

`No; I go to Mr Liston's.'

`Ah! is it so?'

`Even so, Ellison; but no more till we meet again.
I have supported my masquerade with little spirit; but
do not betray me, and we, neither of us, shall lose reputation.'

M. Constant had for a long time been on terms of
intimacy and friendship with Miss Liston. This lady
belonged to one of the most distinguished families in
our country. She was agreeable in her person, had a
fund of good sense, was well informed and perfectly
amiable. Such characters are admirable in the conduct
of life, if not exciting to the imagination; that
precious faculty, which, like the element of fire, the most
powerful and dangerous agent, may warm, or may consume
us. Long and intimate friendship between unfettered
persons of different sexes is very likely to terminate,
as that of M. Constant and Miss Liston terminated,
in an engagement.

He had a sentiment of deep and fixed affection for
her, which, probably, no influence could have materially
affected; but when that being crossed his path who seemed
to him to realize the brightest visions of his youth,
he felt a secret consciousness that the fidelity of his affection
was endangered. The little mystery in which
the unknown was shrouded, the very circumstance of
calling her `the unknown,' magnified the importance of
the affair, as objects are enlarged, seen through a mist.
He very wisely and prudently concluded that the surest
way of dispelling all illusion, would be frankly to relate
the particulars to Miss Liston, only reserving to himself
certain feelings which would not be to her edification,
and which he believed would be dispelled by
participating their cause with her. Accordingly, at their
first meeting he was meditating how he should get over
the embarrassment of introducing the subject, when Miss
Liston said, `I have a great pleasure in reserve for

you,' and left him without any farther explanation, and
in a few moments returned, followed by a lady, and
saying as she reentered, `Marie Angely, you and Constant,
my best friends, must not meet as strangers.'
A half suppressed exclamation burst from the lips of
both. All M. Constant's habitual grace forsook him.
He overturned Miss Liston's workstand, workbox,
and working paraphernalia, in advancing to make his
bow. Miss Angely's naturally high color was heightened
to a painful excess; she made an effort to reciprocate
the common courtesies of an introduction, but in
vain; the words faltered on her lips, and after struggling
a moment with opposing feelings, the truth and
simplicity of her heart triumphed, and turning to Miss
Liston, she said, `Your friend, Emma, is the gentleman
I met on the river.'

Miss Liston had been the confidant of all her romantic
young friend's impressions from her moonlight
interview with the stranger, and it was now her turn to
suffer a full share of the embarrassment of the other
parties. She looked to M. Constant for an explanation.
Never had he, in the whole course of his diplomatic career,
been more puzzled; but after a moment's hesitation
he followed Miss Angely in the safe path of ingenuousness
and truly told all the particulars of his late adventures,
concluding with a goodhumored censure of his
friend Ellison, who had long and intimately known Miss
Angely, and who, to gratify his mischief loving temper,
had contrived the mystery which led to the rather awkward
dénouement.

Thus these circumstances, which might have been woven
into an intricate web of delicate embarrassment and
romantic distress, that might have ended in the misery of
one, perhaps of all parties, were divested of their interest
and their danger by being promptly and frankly disclosed.

Miss Angely, whom our readers have already recognised
as the little girl of the inn, had met with Miss Liston
at a boarding school in Boston, where, though Miss
Liston was her elder by several years, they formed an
enthusiastic, and, rare in the annals of boarding schools,
an enduring friendship. Marie Angely had faithfully
discharged the debt of gratitude to Mrs Reynolds, and
though acquiring, as may be supposed, somewhat of the
fastidiousness that accompanies refined education and
intercourse, no one could perceive and abatement of her
respect or affection for her kind protectress, or the slightest
diminution of her familiarity with her. She passed a
part of every summer with her, always called her mother,
and, by the fidelity of her kindness and the charm of her
manner, she diffused light and warmth over the whole
tract of Mrs Reynolds's existence. She linked expectations,
that might have been blasted, to a happy futurity,
and cherished and elevated affections, which, but
for her sunny influence, would have been left to wither
and perish. Oh that the fortunate and happy could know
how much they have in their gift!

Miss Angely had been on one of her annual visits to
her humble friend, and was on her way, accompanied
by her, to New York, where she was to join Miss Liston,
when the incidents occurred which we have related.

There is nothing in the termination of our tale to indemnify
the lover of romance for its previous dulness;
but it is a true story, and its materials must be received
from tradition, and not supplied by imagination.

M. Constant was, in the course of a few weeks, united
to Miss Liston. This lady had long cherished a
hope that her friend would be a permanent member of
her family, and she used every art of affection to persuade
her to remain with her at least so long as she
should decline the suits of all the lovers who were now

thronging around her, attracted by her beauty, or loveliness,
or the eclat she derived from her intimacy with
the wife of the ambassador. M. Constant did not very
warmly second his wife's entreaties. He perhaps had a
poignant recollection of certan elective affinities, and his
experience taught him the truth, if indeed he had not
derived it from a higher source, that, in the present infirm
condition of human virtue, it is always safest and
best not voluntarily to `enter into temptation.'

Miss Angely returned to Boston. M. Constant's
union with Miss Liston was one of uninterrupted confidence
and conjugal happiness; but it was not destined
to be of long duration. His wife died in about a year after
their marriage. Among her papers was found a letter
addressed to her husband, written in expectation of
the fatal issue of the event that had terminated her life,
in which she earnestly recommended her friend as her
successor. In due time her request was honored. M.
Constant married Miss Angely. After residing for some
time in America, they went to France, where she was
received as an ornament to her noble family, and acknowledged
to be `the brightest jewel in its coronet.'

Far from the mean pride of those who shrink from recurring
to the humble stages in their progress to the
heights of fortune, Madame Constant delighted in relating
the vicissitudes of her life, and dwelt particularly on
that period, when, as Mrs Reynolds's handmaid, she considered
herself honored in standing behind the chair of
the wife of the great General Knox.

`The longest day comes to the vesper hour.' Madame
Constant closed at Paris a life of virtue, prosperity,
and happiness, in July 1827.

THE PALISADOES.

BY GRENVILLE MELLEN.

King Lear.

`This, then, at last,' said I, `is the broad and beautiful
Hudson!' I addressed myself to my companion, a tall
fellow, with a healthy look, who stood at my side. But
he had been here before, and a simple nod of acquiescence
was all I received in answer. `There is an air
of singular complacency about some people,' thought I,
`but perhaps it is a necessary virtue in their way of life,
and requires cultivation.' So I surrendered myself, as
well as I could, to my own reflections.

The scene was indeed beautiful. A mellow sunset
was settling upon the hills and waters, and a thousand
flashes played over the distant city, as its spires and
prominent objects caught its glories. Above these
fading lights stretched a heavy line of smoke, already
condensing under the damp atmosphere of the evening,
and reaching far away over the metropolis, till it was
lost in the purpling hues of the sky. At intervals, a dull
sound would seem to come out of the city, and, stealing
over the waters which reposed between us, recalled for a
moment the remembrance of the busy scenes which I had

so lately witnessed there. On one side rose impending
cliffs, their wood crowned summits tinged with the last
blush of the twilight. Below, in the deep shadow of
the rocks against which they seemed to lean, stood the
old trees, that only served to increase the gloom that
extended itself over all the slope to the waters.

Every dell and nook under the gray canopy, had
deepened into blackness, and a perfect night reigned in
the recesses which embosom this delightful river. On
the opposite bank lay a landscape rejoicing in the luxury
of its bright verdure, and rising in gentle undulations,
till its heights reposed in the dreamy light of the sunset.
Far up in the north stretched the magnificent river,
melting in the distance, amidst its forests and rocks and
hills, undisturbed by a breath, and unbroken in its surface,
save where some dark speck was seen to flit across
its bosom, and leave in its track a dusky vapor, which
was almost instantly absorbed in the gathering gloom.
Night was fast falling on everything round me. My eyes
were fastened on the black bank and those towering
cliffs. I was completely lost in reverie. I felt a relief
in gazing there, and strange, long reaching associations
came round me. At one moment, as we passed a little
point that shot out from the shadow, I thought I saw some
low, white object, like a monument, rising on that desolate
shore, and just reflected in the peaceful waters. Perhaps
this was imagination, for I was ready to picture out anything
wild and solemn, as I floated by those dim solitudes.
I had heard tales of places hereabouts, that froze up my
young blood; and then I had felt it break away again
in the heat of my indignation, till it throbbed audibly
through every vein. These recollections came over me
now in all the vividness of former times. Story became
reality, and I pressed my eyes together, and turned
away under the fearful expectation of witnessing some

scene of terror, which would `fright' my exiled spirit
`from its propriety.'

`It's gone! it 's gone! Farewell for aye to whatever
falls into the wake of a steamboat.' These words,
accompanied with a gentle touch at my elbow, caused
me to turn again, and a man stood at my side, directing
my attention to a piece of paper, fluttering upon the
waves behind us, and which I had unconsciously dropped
from my hand in the intenseness of my reverie. `It was
of no consequence,' I said; `some foolish thoughts of
my own. Let the water nymphs underneath make as
much as they may of it, and welcome.' `O'er thoughtful,
and much on the abstract, for one so young, methinks,'
said the stranger, fixing a pair of dark eyes upon me.
`But,' continued he in an undertone, and as though he
was talking with himself, as he looked once more back
on the shadowy waves, `of consequence or not, the
youth's paper is setting in with the current towards the
Red Graves, and will find the shore thereabouts before
morning.' Then turning sharply upon me, `Young
man, yours is not the first nor the only piece of fair, white
paper I have seen floating in upon that desolate point.
We can scarce see it now for the darkness.' I had
heard enough of the soliloquy which preceded this address,
to awaken my curiosity, and as these last words
had no tendency to allay it, I observed that his allusions
were nothing less than Greek to me; but, as the trifling
incident which gave rise to them, had also brought us
in some sort into conversation together, I would make
bold to beg him to go into the matter, and if a story was
to be told, to assure him I would become a willing, nay,
a delighted auditor.

Meanwhile I could not but observe with some surprise,
that we were left alone upon deck. It had become
quite dark, and the night breeze was beginning to

sing over the cool waters. Instead of the last sunlight
reflected faintly on the fading clouds, as I had seen it
when I fixed my gaze on that silent and cheerless shore,
thousands of stars were now twinkling over my head.
Many busy faces were passing before and around me
then, but now one solitary being stood before me. The
man at the helm was above with his light, and, at intervals,
the worn and exhausted furnace feeder would issue
from his dazzling purgatory to wipe his hot brow in the
evening air. These were the two alone, beside ourselves,
who seemed to keep the night watches.

The stranger fairly took the hint I spake upon, and,
beckoning me to the stern of the vessel, desired I would
be seated, while he should relate to me the little story,
the recollection of which I had been instrumental in
recalling to his mind. Following his example, I wrapped
my cloak about me, and stretched myself out on an inclined
seat, in a state of lazy and delicious preparation.
Meanwhile I had taken occasion to scan the exterior of
my companion. He was a man much under the middle
size, of a thin and apparently a wasted frame. His
head was covered with an enormous slouched hat, somewhat
in the Spanish fashion, and under its shadow
appeared a face of uncommon and rather sinister expression.
It seemed to belong to something more than
an octogenarian. It was cadaverous, shrunken, and
pointed, and as incapable of change and muscular pliancy
during the relation which followed, as though it had been
hewn from a block of mummy complexioned marble.
His brow, half hidden under his hat, had contracted
into many furrows; and there they remained, inerasible,
and as immoveable as fate. Eyes of dark gray, the
only moving things, save his thin lips, on the dead surface
of his physiognomy, seemed sometimes to kindle
as with the light of former days, as I from time to

time observed them in the starry brilliancy which they
occasionally reflected. The nose was one which had
evidently been compelled by hunger or decay, from
something well nigh related to a parabola, into a decided
triangle, and was a remnant well worthy of Slawkenbergius,
and one of the best from the promontory. The
cheeks were sallow and solemn, well comporting with
the motionless rigidity of the whole superficies. The
mouth was one which would have puzzled Lavater,
guarded inwardly by perfect files of small, white teeth,
those terrifying indices of something miraculous about an
old proprietor; while without, the skinny lips were tightly
drawn into that downward curve so finely expressive
of malice and contempt. Such a mouth was now to
be my oracle! A chin, pointed as its fellow projection
above, completed this wild and singular countenance.
His beard lay like hoarfrost along its extremities, and
a single glance I got convinced me that the principle of
life had deserted it. It lay withered upon that mysterious
chin. Not a single hair escaped from under cover;
of course, I was justified in the conclusion, that he was
as bald as Time. A sad colored cloak of no particular
cloth, enveloped his whole person, and now and then,
as it waved in the wind, I thought I had discerned the
portentous insignia of high Dutch consequence in the
singular developement of the leg. I set him down as
one of the most ancient of the Ten Breeches. In perfect
keeping with his other extremities, he wore a pair
of pointed shoes, that projected from under his mysterious
robe, and bore some marks of antique origin.

Such was the singular being, beside whom I was
now reclining, in expectation of a tale as singular
as its author. There was certainly something more
than common about this man, fitted to waken thoughts
of a strange and undefinable nature within me. His

presence was a matter that troubled me from the beginning.
I thought of the suddenness of his appearance
before me; and I had no recollection of having seen
any such person on board during the day. His voice
was low, too, but wonderfully deep, and I remembered
when he walked the quarter, it shook as though a double
steam engine was playing beneath it. Judge then,
gentle reader, with what feelings I listened to this master
of mysteries! But I was determined not to be awed out
of my story; and as though to restore me to the consciousness
that something human was still in my neighbourhood,
a strong light from the cabin, shot up from
below, and in its glare I could recognise some still
wakeful faces, that I had seen round me in the daylight.
I therefore reclined once more upon my solitary seat.
The stars were shining brilliantly over our heads, the
waves were rushing and gurgling directly under us,
and he began.

`Those gray, perpendicular rocks, that seemed to absorb
so much of your attention at twilight, are called, in
these vile modern times, the Palisadoes. Time was,
the which I can well remember,'—I ventured a look—but
the big hat put it out of the question—`aye, as though it
were but yesterday, when those topping fellows were
known by the downright sensible name of the Bold
Bruisers; and so men were content to call them, till
that matter of independence crazed this feverish people,
and then almost every spot in the land, if it was so unfortunate
as to be high or queer shaped, was dashed at
once from the family nomenclature, and thenceforward
known by some appellation, with which it was tortured
by the exclusive spirit of the time. There was your
Mount Washington, and Mount Defiance, your Charter

Oaks, and your Cradles of Liberty; Cape Revolution
and the Free Breakers, certain desperate looking
rocks that jutted out along the coast, called Constitution
Boys, and the Tax Takers; and among a host of others,
these veritable perpendicular masses, denominated
the Palisadoes, for the simple reason that their appearance
served to give you some notion of defence and obstinacy;
defence against they knew not what—nothing
in particular; and obstinacy—but I must refer you to
the Bill of Rights, and be careful, I suppose, how I
take in vain that magical word “Freedom.” Yet one
would think, from this poor name, that the hot republicans
believed they could enclose the North River with
a stone wall! Verily, verily there would have been
some meaning in this matter, if the worthy Dutchman,
who ruled that fair city aforetime, but who shall be
nameless, had only succeeded when he swore he would
swivel the Bold Bruisers on their south pivot across
the Hudson, and block up all passage against the British,
by an effectual embargo. Then you might have
talked about palisades with a vengeance; and what
with such a troublesome fence here, and that wicked
“Gate” on the other side, Gotham at least would have
been safe, merely through the terrors excited by its localities.
But we have nearly passed the rocks, and I
must hasten to my story.

`In 1777, while Howe lay in New York, a short distance
down where the country slopes away from those
same Palisadoes, in a beautiful and romantic dell, lived
Isabel Vaughan and her widowed mother. Old Frank
Vaughan, then one of the noblest hearts that beat in
the land, had died in one of the hard times of '76, and
left this little family with a small farm, and, report said,
some bright dollars, to lead out their days, as well as
they could, in the silent residence which he had chosen.

There was an air of uncommon seclusion and peace
about this dwelling. The hand of taste was also betrayed
in the arrangement of foliage and flowers around
the doors and windows. Wild blossoms were creeping
in over your head as you sat at the one, or stood before
the other. A little garden smiled in the sunshine which
lay brightly and calmly along the valley; and at morning
or evening might be seen a fair and graceful creature
bending among the shrubbery, and conducting the
roses and honeysuckles with studious care, in every direction,
and with every fanciful variety, to embower the
sweet and solitary spot that seemed to contain all her
happiness.

`I need not describe Isabel to you. She was the delight
and support of her little home, and as beautiful as
the most brilliant of the flowers she watched over. She
had grown up in the bosom of a virtuous family, and
her young mind had become early imbued with that deep
enthusiasm, which the times had generated in the
breasts of all the people, and in which her father largely
participated. The stern and devoted spirit which
had entered and expanded the hearts of the Puritans in
their early struggles, seemed to have come with little
alloy down to the time of the Revolution, and in some
instances to have brought with it that austere sense of
duty and abandonment to the cause, which characterised
the pilgrim fathers. With these feelings Frank
Vaughan rushed to the ranks, and fell; and with these
feelings, somewhat softened indeed, but of the same
character, did his beautiful daughter and her aged
mother look out upon the storm that was gathering and
raging around them, and pray heaven for favor on the
cause, feeling thankful for the quiet they were permitted
to enjoy while that cause was now trying by battle
and blood. It was therefore rather a melancholy habit

into which she had grown, than a decided pleasure,
which led Isabel to the daily observation of her wild
flowers and her garden. Often, as she wandered among
them at still evening, she would stand and listen with a
beating heart, as the noise of cannon rolled on her ear
from the distant city, and her thoughts would fly to her
bleeding country, and she would go in and weep with
her mother, as these dreary signals recalled to their
minds the image of the husband and the father.

`In the situation they were in, it can hardly be
expected that their habitation escaped the notice of
the British parties which were scouring the country
in every direction. Nor was it passed unheeded.
But its very situation was the surest pledge of its
protection. The lonely condition of its inmates, the
meek and quiet spirit with which it necessarily surrendered
the little hospitality which it could afford, and the
silent, but sorrowful sympathy which its helpless inhabitants
accorded to their suffering country, conciliated
the respect even of their enemies, and Isabel Vaughan
and her lonely parent found friends in those who had
sworn vengeance against their land, and were now
passing through it with violence. Sometimes, indeed,
the abrupt appearance and unceremonious demeanour of
the uncultivated and ferocious soldier, awed them into a
painful sense of their apparently unprotected state, and
their unfortunate position in a part of the country extremely
liable to the commotions of the period. But
the troops that passed that way were taught to regard
the spot as exempt from the privilege of violence, and
strictly charged to refrain from any injury of its peaceful
and retired occupants. The leaders of the small
parties that passed that way in the course of their excursions,
gay, and free of speech and manner as they come
to be in camp and in the ardor of war, still found, that

in this humble retreat, they were invariably chastened
into that quiet respect, which strict and fearless virtue
never fails to command; and the presence of Isabel
Vaughan always excited a feeling of regard, transient
though it might be, while the recollection of her carried
with it a degree of undefined interest, into the most
careless bosoms among them. It was not strange,
therefore, if the impression made even upon such hearts
on such occasions, should sometimes go with them to
the garrison, and that reports should follow of certain
fair ladies in the wilderness, and beauty hard by, as
worthy a respectful bumper, as any to be found over the
water. It required but a short time for sentiments like
these, escaping even as they did like bubbles from the
surface of volatile recollections, to have their due effect
in exciting the curiosity, that under such circumstances
is never too prone to slumber.

`Thus, the presence of a beautiful girl in such a beautiful
and fairylike seclusion, could not long remain a
secret with those finer hearts, whose existence passes
under the alternate sway of love and glory; and but few
evenings had elapsed after the cottage had first opened
its lowly doors to its enemies, when Isabel, from her
garden, saw a person approaching, whom, by his dress,
she presumed to be an officer of rank. It was not an
unusual occurrence that her solitude should be thus
broken in upon; but they were perilous and hurried
times; strange and terrifying tales had lately found their
way to their retreat; the sense of the helplessness of
herself and her mother was pressing daily more and
more upon her; and, at this moment, her mother was
alone, and twilight was fast closing in. Her impulse
was to retreat rapidly; but the stranger approached
by a side path, and was before her, as she was about
to enter the door. With a slight, graceful bow he

begged her to remain one moment, and pardon his
abrupt approach; soldiers were unused to apologies,
and they were not things to be conned, at that day.
Besides, he was sorry to say, he believed he was in an
enemy's country—beautiful as it appeared. A faint
smile mingled with the blush of Isabel, as she received
the acknowledgment, and, stepping hastily forward, invited
the stranger to enter, and partake of the poor, but
only hospitality which their humble roof could afford
either to friends or foes; for she innocently conceived
that nothing more sentimental than forage could have
induced a soldier, even such an one, at such a time, to
seek a spot so unimportant and secluded.

`Murray, for that was the name of the youthful officer,
was unexpectedly embarrassed. He had heard that in
this wild and romantic retreat there was a specimen of
beauty worthy a sphere far above the humble one in
which it shone, and which was fitted to prove attractive
to an ardent and sensitive mind; but he was not
prepared to find one there whose extreme loveliness
forced itself upon him at once, and whose whole appearance
could captivate an eye, that had been by no
means inactive, in its time, among the fair and favored
of his own land. He did not come to see one whose
presence could at once dispel all the lighter feelings
and intentions with which youth and warm hearts, in his
adventurous course of life, approach the shrine of beauty;
and he little expected, when he entered the unprotected
home of a female with a soldier's freedom and
an enemy's license, that he should find there a person,
before whom the idea of such freedom made him feel
abashed, and whose simple and unconstrained manner
demanded his perfect respect, and singularly engaged
his attention. Isabel's attractions were the attractions
of nature and simplicity, mingled with a clear perception

of propriety, and the graces of a well directed
and well informed mind. Taste lent all its aid to strong
and elevated feelings, and formed a character and presence
that could not fail of inspiring more than common
interest.

`Under the impression of an interview and feelings,
therefore, for which he was so little prepared, Murray
was unexpectedly confused; and when he found himself
under the roof that had so frequently opened its unresisting
doors to those whom he commanded, and thought
of the possibility of violence done, or insult offered there,
and then glanced his eye upon the interesting form before
him, he hardly knew how to extenuate the incivility
and sin of his intrusion. In despair of any effectual explanation,
he referred in a hurried manner, to the fears
he entertained of any difficulties or troubles that had
been occasioned there by the rough and importunate
soldiery; they were in some degree under his command;
he felt answerable for them; and concluded with
assuring the family ample protection in future from all
further annoyance as far as his powers would permit.
The assurance was received with a thankful but a distant
spirit. Isabel's was a mind not easily drawn away,
or driven by sudden feelings from its propriety. She
had observed Murray's embarrassment, and sought to
relieve it, at once, as far as she could, for it was as
painful to her to observe, as it was to him to bear it.
The warmth and kindness of manner in which this was
done had struck him, and he remembered it. But Isabel
looked upon her guest as an enemy. She had been
taught to do so; and it had, she thought, grown into an
antipathy. It was difficult to overcome these things,
and though the stranger recommended himself strongly
to her, by his striking demeanour, his conversation, and
the generosity of his sentiments, standing in the relation

he did to them, and the country they honored, still he
was an enemy, and she believed it was impossible that
relation could ever be forgotten. The interview, however,
begun with so much uneasiness on the part of
Murray, became interesting to him. The coldness of
the stranger gave way to the native glow of his temperament,
and his conversation kindled into gaiety. The
intercourse was new to him. It was divested of all that
had sickened him elsewhere. It was the employment
of his mind. On the other side, Isabel, though not gay,
became insensibly interested and even animated when
her mind and her feelings were brought into direct collision
with what she honored and esteemed, wherever she
met them—talent and enthusiasm. She even forgot the
individual while she paid respect to his sentiments.

`Murray, in extending the offer of his protection, spoke
of the defenceless character of the country.

“`Why will you touch us there,” said Isabel, “while
you have driven us to these things, in the midst of our
want of means and our deprivations? but,” continued she,
recollecting her father, “there is a defence, which perhaps
you cannot see, in strong hearts and clear consciences.”

“`Pardon me, pardon me!” said Murray hastily; “I
surely forget where I am, to speak of such subjects here;
but within these walls, I hope I shall not be considered
an enemy; I hope we shall never meet as such.” Then
recollecting himself he added—“if, indeed, we should
ever meet again.”

“`Alas! sir,” said Isabel “you are our superiors;
and a prohibition, I fear me, would be of little avail,
while the foe holds our land under the law of the
strongest.”

“`If then, there is no prohibition,” returned Murray
warmly, “I shall surely take every fair advantage which
the war offers.”

“`We are unused to command,” said Isabel, calmly,
and with a faint smile.

“`Not so unused,” whispered Murray to himself;
“for I obey you already.”

`Murray departed. He had been a delighted witness
of the beautiful simplicity of this little family, and the
loveliness of the young creature that adorned it, and he
quitted the house with feelings of mingled admiration
and regret. He was a person of that free and unprejudiced
spirit, that acknowledged worth and bowed to it
wherever he found it, from an innate love of virtue.
His was a spirit too noble to be restricted to the modes
of admiration which the society he rose in avowed and
practised, and whether he met it in the gay metropolis
of a foreign land, or on the borders of the forests of a
new one, he gave his heart, undisguisedly, to the homage
of virtue and purity in woman. His was the ardent
spirit that saw readily and believed unhesitatingly. In
Isabel Vaughan, therefore, he saw enough even in a
first single interview, to delight him, because he saw
that which reconciled itself at once with the high and
generous conceptions he had formed of valuable character,
and which he had loved to contemplate. If his
spirit was a rapid stream, it was also a deep one; unlike
those that are oftentimes shallow in proportion to their
velocity.

`The recollection of that interview retained a vividness
in the mind of Murray, that soon convinced him the repetition
of it was necessary to his peace. His avocations,
his duties, his pleasures grew dull, and time hung
like a weight upon him. If he smiled at the idea of a
passion, it was the secret smile of satisfaction, and he
felt no disposition then to check its young career. The
introduction, therefore, such as it was, was duly improved.

Murray found himself, in a few weeks, the welcome and
even the cherished guest of Isabel and her mother; for
Isabel discovered that time was fast robbing her of the
prejudice which she had heretofore believed was her
unalienable inheritance. It was a truth, indeed, of which
that unsuspecting girl was not yet aware—as who would
be, in her situation?—that she was ignorant of her own
heart. She did not seem to recollect the miraculous
operation of the affections, the wayward course and
transforming power of the passions. Least of all did she
think that the deep fountains of her bosom could be
broken up, by an influence that worked unseen and almost
unknown, until the waters suddenly burst the control
in which they might otherwise have slumbered forever.
With her, as with every woman, love had been
a dream, but a beautiful and glorious one, and one
which she tremblingly hoped to realize. But that she
should realize it in Murray, that her fate should be thus
mysteriously linked with his, was more than she had
thought of. It was more than she could believe. But
when, after many continued interviews, each more anxiously
looked for, and each more tenderly recollected
than that which had preceded it, she breathed the low
voiced confession to her own bosom, then it was that she
first woke to the power and progress of her passion. It
is needless to follow its course. It may be enough to
say that but few months had flown over the lovers, and
the peaceful home of Isabel, and all its blooming and
blushing flowers witnessed their plighted faith.

“`I can scarce believe it,” whispered Isabel, smiling
through her tears, “my lover, George, and yet my enemy!”

“`Never! my most beautiful foe; this treaty merges
country and all!” cried Murray.

`Isabel Vaughan was now happy; and, in the pure
warmth of her heart,

she gave free and joyous way to this new current of
thought that went brightening and exulting before her in
all the delicious transparency of a first and holy passion.
She felt that she loved, before she considered the object
of her admiration; and when she did so, she felt
her resentments die within her. She thought of the
time when she had unconsciously hated the very sound
of “Briton;” and to recoil from him, as from an enemy,
she remembered, had been a part of the great doctrine
of the day, inculcated in her hearing; and now she
found her affections were clinging to such a man; that
her heart was entwining itself with such a heart, and
that she was secretly vowing herself to an enemy, to
the desolater of her house, perhaps to the murderer of
her father. She went to her mother, and confessed, and
wept with her. She felt that every interview had only
linked her fate more indissolubly with his, for Murray
had now become the almost constant companion of
Isabel and her mother.

`As often as duty permitted him, he glided from the
city, to linger round this fair shrine of beauty, amidst
the flowers, and silence, and innocence which embosomed
it. He loved Isabel with a high and honorable love.
Often with that mother and daughter, in the hushed
evenings, did he mourn, as a soldier should mourn, the
fate which made him an enemy to the country they were
proud of; and often would he be ready in the fulness of
his heart to renounce all remembrance of national enmity,
till some sullen roar recalled his scattered feelings,
and he remembered with sternness that he heard the
voice of his country calling him to his faith and his vows

of honor. Often, when the moon rode high, and the
head of Isabel reclined on his bosom in the bower that
she had hung with blossoms and wild leaves, would he
part her dark hair and whisper over her an abjuration of
glory and even of his country, to give himself up to her
and happiness in that little paradise of retirement and
peace. But these were dreams of love. These were
the words of deep, impassioned feeling. They are those
which every heart has felt and every heart has uttered,
in its moments of abandonment. They are the simple
elements, the infant movements of the heart, developed,
and carried out, in the first, the best, the holiest expressions
which the soul lends to the lips. They are
nature; they are truth.

`But the story of love is an oft told tale. I will not
detain you to recount its thousand little incidents and
misgivings; its trifles, swelled into the importance of
events, and the numerous fluctuations of its hopes and
fears. I will pass them over. We will leave them to
their early troth, to the full fruition of their morning promises
and joys, to join the parties again at an advanced
period of their fortunes. Far other things were now
to engage the attention of the young soldier. Howe
was about to evacuate New York, and draw off his
forces for Philadelphia, and Murray must accompany
his regiment. The golden string must be parted. “Glory,”
said he, “is little better than blood, and honor is a
shadow that we are chasing over the graves of our fellows.
Ambition, if it wins the laurel, how often does it
return with a marble brow, and wreathed in cypress!”

“`And these flowers,” said Isabel, “must fade just at
the moment when they began to look brightest in my
eyes, and these buds must be checked in their promise,
for I have no heart to cherish them now. Strange!
that he has such an influence on my little Eden here—

and yet he is one of those who were enemies of my
father!”

`Such were the unsophisticated movements of this
young and unsullied heart. So strong an attachment
could not suffer a sudden deprivation without an uncommon
and painful struggle.

“`We must part in a few days, Isabel,” said Murray.
It was two nights before his intended departure. There
was no answer returned. “Tomorrow night, Isabel, is
the last night I may ever see you.” There was no
answer, but the agonized girl was upon his bosom in
tears. “But,” said she, at last, calmly looking into his
face, “you said you should return; and you then spoke
of our never parting again. Let us believe that and be
happy.” It was now Murray's turn to be agitated.
His manner had evidently been constrained. When he
came, he was thoughtful and pale. He now became
hurried and abrupt.

“`But, Isabel, who may talk to us of returns and
welcomes? The chances of life are doubled against us.
Fate plays hard with us, Isabel. We can promise
nothing; we can hope nothing; we must go where life
is doubtful, and dishonor worse than death; and yet
that dishonor might save the life of those we love!
Curse, curse on the alternative!” Murray wrung her
hand, and Isabel was startled at his vehemence. The
last words, uttered in a lower tone, caught her attention,
and she kindled as she spoke, “What is it you say,
George? You talk of dishonor and alternatives; what
have they to do with you, or you with them? Why talk
of them in my presence? Is there any proposal I am to
listen to in which either of those words are implicated?
If so, you may yet learn how firmly I can say farewell.
My father knew not hesitation where such terms were
mentioned, and his daughter—”

“`For God's sake, Isabel, no more, no more;” and
he cast on her a look that convinced that trembling girl
how deeply she had wronged him by her wild and hurrying
suspicions. She now stood in the attitude of one
imploring forgiveness. “Nay, Isabel,” murmured he,
as with a trembling hand he threw back her dark and
disordered hair, “I will say nothing of the injustice you
have done me. This is no time for cruel words or
wounded feelings. I must leave you. A return here,
by our commander, is spoken of as something possible;
but the war goes on with a varied success. I can see
nothing certain through this gloom, and there are dangers
and difficulties in our way that you know nothing
of.” And again he grew thoughtful and troubled, as he
walked away, and his bosom rose and fell as though
he was struggling for mastery with some powerful and
terrible emotion. “Dishonor!” breathed he to himself,
“did she conceive her fame was trying me in this way?
Alas! if she knew the horrible trial of defending it.”
Suddenly, by one of those despairing exertions of which
we are sometimes capable, he turned and approached the
agitated Isabel with a composed mein and a faint smile.

“`But why, my beloved girl, why anticipate all this
sorrow? I shall see you again. I will come to you
once more; tomorrow, tomorrow at twilight, I shall be
with you. Yet should the hurry of departure prevent
even this short interview, for short it must be, still you
shall hear from me. Close at the little landing under
the cliffs, the Palisadoes, you shall find my messenger.
You remember the boat I have so often employed to
convey word to you. You will find it there at dark.
Remember—not too early—descend the winding footpath
to the sands, and receive, and send me in return,
a few words; a few words, Isabel! merely a farewell.
The fellow is trusty; he will find me. And now,” as he

spoke, Murray gently lifted from her neck a beautiful
and delicate picture. He gazed on it. “It will speak
to me, Isabel, when I am gone, and admonish me, and
cheer me; and it shall be my shield,” said he, as he
placed it upon his heart. Isabel bowed in silence over it.
She believed that heart was beating in single and utter
devotion for her; last of all did she believe that the
sentiments of the world, the voice of man, could quicken
or retard its pulsations. She believed everything that
woman should believe, and she was happy. Still it was
the happiness of tears; the happiness of a bewildered
and anxious bosom. In a few moments those pulses
seemed still; her arms fell gently upon her breast; she
heard a murmur that sounded like a farewell, and the
noise of a door closing at her side. She looked up, and
Murray was gone.

`The next day rose heavily on Isabel. The winds
played rudely among her flowers, and swept hoarsely
over her wild blossoms, bending them to the ground.
She thought she saw her own fate shadowed out in
these frowns of nature upon some of her fairest works.
She compared herself with every delicate plant that
she saw crouching under the blast, and in the clouds
that sailed, dull and dim, along the leaden sky, she
pictured strange forms, that seemed to scowl upon her
out of their gloomy shrouds. Her haunted fancy ached
with painful and distressful anticipations. She recalled
the mysterious manner in which Murray had parted
from her. She thought of the doubts he had expressed
about meeting her, and she resolved them into a thousand
realities. She remembered his broken and singular
manner, and her excited imagination teemed with forms
of terror, peculiar to the dangerous and heart rending
scenes to which his profession was the direct and deadly
pathway. She endured all that a young and sensitive

and devoted spirit may be supposed to suffer in solitude,
surrendered to its loneliest reflections, and led, by a
deep, and before unfelt interest in a loved individual, to
throw around him all its fairy work of hopes and fears,
to repose in him all her sacred promises of joy, and all
her wishes of future happiness, while that object is away,
beyond her control or her knowledge, and exposed to
the saddest chances of the world, the additional hazards
of a desolating war, and the deadly wrath of man. The
day thus passed on, wearisome and lonely. Nature
seemed to mourn with this frail and interesting creature,
who was gazing for hours upon its lights and shadows.
The sun shone out sometimes, but it was with a sad
and discolored beam. The breezes came as usual, but
they wafted away the perfume, and went off in hollow
sounds down the valley. Some of the sweetest flowers
that Isabel loved to tend were beaten down and withered;
and the roses showered their drooping leaves round
the door, and in at the windows. The birds used to
linger among the trees, but now they flew silently over
the garden, and the hum of the bees was not heard
there. It is not strange that melancholy presentiments
crowded round Isabel in her cheerless retreat. She
saw the sun go down with a faint and sullen light, and
she waited with anxious and indescribable feelings for
the coming twilight. At times she listened with intense
earnestness that she might hear footsteps coming on the
wind; but the solitude only deepened as the shades of
evening stole in, and yet Murray came not.

“`It is past the twilight,” said she to herself, as she
paced along the brink of the Palisadoes; “it is past the
twilight, and time he were coming; but I will surprise
him. My white dress shall not betray me on these cliffs;”
and she wrapped a light tartan cloak about her, and
stood back from the summit and gazed out upon the

deep and far Hudson, as it rolled its chafed waves upon
the shore. There was nothing to be discerned. The
stars were here and there to be seen peeping from
among the clouds as they went driving over the
heavens, and as her eye wandered among them, her
bodings of ill seemed to derive fresh confirmation from
the troubled appearance of the elements. Yet again
she took courage when she thought how much was to
be charged to her busy and melancholy imagination, and,
by an effort, she succeeded in stilling the throbs of her
heart, and waited in calm patience for evening to gather
in, believing that a short time would put a period to her
suffering anxiety. Meanwhile, enough could be gathered
by eye and ear from the elevated situation which
she occupied, to convince Isabel that the busy note of
preparation had sounded in the camp, and that a hurried
and bustling night was to pass in the city. Often, as
the rising wind swept over the long reach of waters and
the crags, there came, borne upon its wings, the faint
roll of the drums, and sometimes the long, deep, reechoing
peal of guns, sending their muttering signals far
and wide, till they died in the murmurs of the small
waves, or the moan of the breeze. Then there might
be seen, curving upwards far into the air, a sudden, distant
line of light, illumining the horizon for a moment,
and then sinking with a lengthened train over the distant
and mustering city. A brilliant, dazzling star
would then hover over the metropolis, and as suddenly
vanish, to be succeeded by some other fiery telegraph.
Then there would come again the swelling noise of the
drum, as the air freshened for a moment, and over and
above all, the small, but clear strain of the bugle would
float away, like notes of glorious music, even to the
clouds. There was something strangely wild and solemn
in this scene, and Isabel felt all her enthusiasm wake
within her as she beheld and listened. The rocket and
the horn seemed to bring Murray once more before her,
and her vivid associations for a moment annihilated the
very rocks and seas that lay between them. But, as if
on the instant to turn her vision of fancy to the still
more blessed reality, an object can be descried making
its way to the shore. A boat approaches. Drawing as
far back as possible without losing sight of the boat,
which was making rapidly in on the strength of four
oars, Isabel gazed unseen upon its movements. A
doubtful and wondering sensation seizes her, as she
discovers four persons are hastily disembarking. She
feels satisfied that one of them is Murray; but why
come so attended? Darkness cannot aid her; it is now
too late to retreat. If she stirs into the twilight, she
will be discovered. While she remains in silent astonishment,
the party has disappeared in the little recess
at the foot of the path that leads from above. They are
certainly about to ascend. She listens. The sound of
low, quick voices comes up—an interval of silence—
and the sharp report of pistol shots rings along the
rocks. A shriek answers its echoes above, and a white
figure is seen rushing down the narrow path to that enclosure.
Meantime there is hot haste upon the shore.
The boat is immediately filled, and hurryingly shoved
off from the bank. It has hardly entered the stream,
when a sullen plunge of something overboard is heard.
A confused dashing of oars, and the boat has disappeared
in the closing gloom of the evening.

`And there is Isabel upon that now dark and silent
shore! She is bending over the grass as though in
search of something, and dull smoke wreaths are curling
over her head, among the branches of the trees, and
against the old rocks. She has caught at something
which the ray of a star lighted for a moment. She

grasps it—it is her own picture! The string that bore
it is severed, and drops of warm blood are resting on its
lineaments. Another long thrilling shriek rings along
those cliffs, and the agonized girl falls on her face,
alone, and motionless.

`From that long and deadly swoon, Isabel Vaughan
never returned to earth the same being that she was.
The stroke had reached her heart, and all its impulses
were paralysed. Her mind withered, and her reason
fled, and over the waste there played the flickering, unearthly
light of ruined hopes and blasted peace, like
that which wanders round decay, amidst tombs and solitudes.
Well might we then say her sorrowful fears
were truly, beautifully, but sadly fulfilled. She was,
indeed, the blossom cut off, the flower bowed down.
She was the unsullied flower of the light, scathed on the
stalk; the delicate bud crushed into the dust, while it
gave rich promise of expanding into beauty. Well did
she fear for her bower and her home, when she saw the
leaves, and the bloom that enveloped them, falling to the
ground, and leaving their habitations cold and desolate.
Her spirit was now the rifled and desolate dwelling.
Well did she fear for the clouds, and the hollow winds,
and the tearful lustre of the sinking sun! The deep
mist had come over her soul. The music of death was
ringing through the chambers of her heart, and the sacred
fire of intellect was expiring in its ashes!

`Still Isabel was spared. Still that fair, pale relic of
loveliness was left to gaze upon, and to wonder and
weep over. Did you seek her at the now afflicted retreat,
where she had first learned to love, you would
find her, an attenuated form, culling sweet flowers, “To
twine into wreaths,” she said, “for her young soldier.”
Then they were to scatter over his grave; and sometimes

she would smile through her tears, and say they
were gathered for her bridal. But did you see her, as
I have often seen her, in the neighborhood of those
frowning Palisadoes, you saw a different, but never a
more heart rending object. Often at nightfall, when I
have strayed towards the crags in days long past, I
have seen Isabel Vaughan standing like a statue upon
the heights, her long hair floating on the evening wind,
and her almost vanishing figure shaking as she drew
her tartan round her, and gazed wistfully over the Hudson.
I have seen her gesticulate on the brink of the
cliffs, at one moment as though she was reproaching
some one near her, and at the next, urging him to keep
silent and listen.

`One evening I had watched her till my eyes ran over
with tears. She was standing in the same spot, talking
wildly and rapidly with herself, and her manner was
more estranged than usual. In moving towards the
footpath that laid below, she passed me, but expressed
no surprise at my presence. She observed my tears.
“Why do you weep?” said she; “you have nothing to
weep for; but here are flowers; they always comfort me;
they used to comfort him;” and she offered me some
wild blossoms. “But,” said she, drawing near me, and
looking wistfully in my face, “think you the water is
deep, and do you know what has changed its color?
And they tell me, too, that he sleeps below there; but
we wont believe it; he is yonder—yonder—I know it,”
and she pointed off towards the city; “and you know he
told me to write him farewell, and I send every night by
the boat. Come! here are more flowers. Take more
flowers!” With these words she turned from me,
and passed down the footway, singing, as she went,
an incoherent and mournful air, that stole up in low
and plaintive cadences as she wound into the dell.

With painful interest I watched her movements. It
was now near dusk, and I saw her issue from the little
recess of low woods, and stand upon the very brink
of the river. I had followed her down, and could not
but notice now the deep melancholy of her mind. Yet
she shed no tears. She raised her hands to her brow,
and looked for a long time under them at the still
waters. At length she slowly drew from her bosom
a small folded paper, and murmuring a few indistinct
words, threw it forth upon the waves, as far as her
feeble strength would permit. Her eye, and all her
faculties seemed to follow it as it floated away, with
an intensity that betrayed in a manner distressfully
palpable, the “total eclipse” of that beautiful mind.
“There, there,” continued she, in a deep and rapid voice,
“be sure you carry it to him; it is a farewell, and he charged
me to send it. Be quick, or it will go out with the
tide, and tell him,” cried she, sending her voice out into
the darkness, “tell him, I have been waiting a long time
for an answer, and when he comes, tell him to come
alone, for they would not let him stay when he came
last, and it broke my heart, and now they say I am
mad;” and once more the wild notes of her monotonous
song rose from the shadowy shore. I accompanied her
home that night, and returned her to her weeping and
heartbroken mother.

`Often, in the dewy twilight did I witness that scene,
under those dreary Palisadoes. Often have I seen her
little white messengers tossing and eddying upon the
current, as she thought them cheerily on their way to
her lover. Frequently, at the break of morning, I have
seen her fragments of paper circling within reach of the
shore, or floating in upon that point towards which your
attention was directed. On one occasion I had the curiosity
to draw one of these singular missives from the

water. It bore a black seal, and was impressed with
some little love conceit that I could not construe. With
care I succeeded in opening it, without injury. It was
evidently written in haste. There were but few words,
and they ran thus:—

“`Farewell, George, farewell! you charged me to
write farewell—but you will return when the army
comes back. I heard the drums last night when you
went. Farewell! Here is some of my hair. See how
white it has grown! all my hair is white; for something
strange has passed over my head, and I can feel it now!
Farewell—the boat is coming—farewell!”

`Over these incoherent and almost illegible words lay
a portion of hair, white as the paper which had enfolded
it, and a few rose leaves, dry and withered.

`For many weary months, almost nightly, did Isabel
Vaughan haunt those high rocks of the Hudson. She
seemed to grow wilder, as time went by, and although
when met elsewhere, a settled melancholy was to be observed,
wearing her slowly away, yet upon the Palisadoes,
she roamed along with starts and gestures increasingly
violent and frantic.

`The season was getting to be bleak and cold. The
leaves were beginning to drop from the trees, and the
flowers round Isabel's dwelling had all closed up and
fallen from their places. It was the time of decaying
nature. Still the poor maniac glided nightly along the
cliff, heedless of the elements. She was beyond the
reach of the things of earth.

`The British had returned to New York. There was
high mustering again in the city, and the noise of war
again broke upon the startled land. Again the distant
drum might be heard to roll its far summons, coming

like a murmur on the ear, and again the roar of
ordnance pealed over the hills and rivers, calling the
frighted inhabitants to the recollection of past horrors,
and the anticipation of others yet to come.

`It was one of those chill and piercing evenings which
I have described, when, following my wayward inclination,
I wandered as usual to the Palisadoes. True to
her melancholy associations, Isabel was there, upon the
upper rock, gazing with an appearance of uncommon
interest towards the city. I thought I could discover
a new expression lighting up her pale countenance.
A distant shot rolled away upon the wind. A few rapid
words escaped her, and she was again silent, listening
and looking with increasing earnestness. The note of
a bugle was then wafted upon a rising gust. It was
answered by a scream, and she clapped her hands and
tossed them madly over her head. “He is coming! he is
coming!” cried she. “I hear his music. Hush! Isabel,
you must not betray yourself. Remember! `not too
early, Isabel,”' and she drew back from the verge, and
became silent. A brilliant light illuminated for a moment
the horizon towards the south, and as she caught
its glare, she cried, “It is his signal! there was one like
that before!” and a convulsive laugh burst from her lips.
As it died away, I saw her sink upon the rocks till she
seemed crouching upon the brink of the precipice, and
gaze with her hands raised to her brow, in the eager
and bewildered manner I had before noticed, as though
she would penetrate farther by thus shading her eyes
in that uncertain light. A sound like the dipping of
oars drew my attention. I turned, and saw a boat slowly
making its way under the cliffs where we stood. At
that moment another terrifying shriek broke upon the
stillness—“I come, George—I am here—here!”—and
as I again turned in horror, a dim white object was seen

plunging into the abyss between me and that now solitary
cliff! There could be no mistake—she was gone!
With a beating heart, I leaped down the path. I fancied
I heard a low moan; it might have been the wind,
but there was no time to listen. When I reached the
dell, there were feet passing hastily to and fro, and as I
approached I saw some one kneeling. He was at the
side of Isabel! “It is too late!” said the stranger—“I
saw her fall as I sprang from the boat; but she smiles
even in death. Poor Murray! poor Murray!” “You
knew him, then,” said I; “you know something of this
sad tale.” but I could ask nothing. I kneeled to gaze
upon the corpse. She lay within a few feet of the grave
of her lover. Her countenance was but slightly mutilated;
scarcely at all; but her long white hair, that had been
bleached by sorrow, lay upon her bosom, buried in blood.

`The stranger was an elderly British officer. As he
seemed to be deeply affected by the harrowing spectacle
before us, and as I had heard him mention the name
of Murray in a tone of compassionate and melancholy
recollection, I concluded he might acquaint me with
some matters relating to this sad history, of which I remained
ignorant. In a few words he informed me that
he was the friend of the unhappy young man, who met
his untimely fate on the dark spot where we then stood.
There were broken hints, a confused story of hasty
words between Murray and another—of some unholy
attempt to fix a stigma on the pure fame of Isabel
Vaughan. The sin of insult—such insult! could be
washed away only by blood. The infatuation had its
full effect. God was forgotten, and man obeyed, and we
have seen the issue! Murray fell, and the villain triumphed!
The wound proving instantly mortal, the victorious
fiend—for he could be nothing less than a fiend—through
fear of detection, or in the delirium of guilt, flung the

bleeding corpse of his adversary into the waves, and
hurried from the scene.

“`This then must be his grave,” said I, pointing to
the low mound at our feet; “she spoke of some one
buried here, and a grave that they had told her about.”

“`To learn the certainty of that fact was the motive
that brought me hither,” returned the stranger. “I had
heard something of the humble burial of an officer
whose body was found hereabouts, soon after; but, as
our forces were hurried away, I was constrained to
delay inquiry till this eventful evening. As for him who
laid him low in that narrow house,” continued he, “he
has long ago expiated his crime. He was discovered—
how could it be otherwise?—and died ignominiously.”

`The stranger looked long and mournfully upon the
grave of his young friend. He spoke in a manly, but
feeling tone, of the warm but mistaken spirit that had
driven him to this wretched end, and expressed a sorrowful
satisfaction in finding that his remains had been
committed decently to the earth. “This is a wild, but
sacred place for him to slumber in,” he said. “Let him
rest! He will not be forgotten.” Having offered the
assistance of his party, we bore the ghastly form of
Isabel to the dwelling it once adorned. Description
would falter, in presenting the scene of that hapless
home; of that mother, beside her lifeless daughter!
The veil is dropped.

`Isabel Vaughan and George Murray sleep side by
side, in that green dell beneath the Palisadoes. There
is nothing to mark their graves, but a little mound, with
a foot and head stone. The tale is too melancholy for
marble; but it is engraven in lines of terror upon the
recollection of those who have survived those stormy
times. Tradition, not content with the gloomy character
of the facts, whispers of secret murder committed in

those shades, and points to those graves as spots where
dark handed violence, the dagger of an assassin, sent
down its victim to oblivion; and the Christian, the man
of God, with the truth of this sad story yet green in his
memory, still tells you of murder done there, and with
pious eloquence depicts to you, glowing, exasperated,
and guilty youth rushing to the hazard, with crime in
his heart and death on his lips, to prove his respect for
man, by daring the laws of the Almighty. There is a
mystery in these things; let the world think of it, if it
will. It is not my business to employ the warning voice
of the preacher; but I tell you, that for many years,
young men and maidens, the curious, the gay, and the
sorrowful, from all the country round, made frequent and
silent pilgrimage to the Red Graves of the Hudson.'

THE HAUNTED WOOD.

BY I. M'LELLAN.

THE DOOMED SHIP.

THE INDIAN WIFE.

BY THE AUTHOR OF HOBOMOK.

WILLYS.

Tahmiroo was the daughter of a powerful Sioux
chieftain; and she was the only being ever known to
turn the relentless old man from a savage purpose.
Something of this influence was owing to her infantile
beauty; but more to the gentleness of which that beauty
was the emblem. Her's was a species of loveliness
rare among Indian girls. Her figure had the flexile
grace so appropriate to protected and dependant woman
in refined countries; her ripe, pouting lip, and dimpled
cheek wore the pleading air of aggrieved childhood;
and her dark eye had such an habitual expression of
timidity and fear, that the young Sioux called her the
`Startled Fawn.'

I know not whether her father's broad lands, or her
own appealing beauty, was the most powerful cause of
admiration; but certain it is, Tahmiroo was the unrivalled
belle of the Sioux. She was a creature all formed
for love. Her downcast eye, her trembling lip, and
her quiet, submissive motion, all spoke its language;
yet various young chieftains had in vain sought her affections,
and when her father urged her to strengthen
his power by an alliance, she answered him only by her
tears.

This state of things continued until 1765, when a
company of French traders came to reside there, for
the sake of deriving profit from the fur trade. Among
them was Florimond de Rancé, a young, indolent Adonis,
whom pure ennui had led from Quebec to the Falls
of St Anthony. His fair, round face, and studied foppery
of dress might have done little toward gaining the
heart of the gentle Sioux; but there was a deference
and courtesy in his manner, which the Indian never
pays to degraded woman, and Tahmiroo's deep sensibilities
were touched by it. A more careful arrangement
of her rude dress, an anxiety to speak his language
fluently, and a close observance of European
customs soon betrayed the subtle power, which was fast
making her its slave. The ready vanity of the Frenchman
quickly perceived it. At first he encouraged it
with that sort of undefined pleasure, which man always
feels in awakening strong affection in the hearts of even
the most insignificant. Then the idea that, though an
Indian, she was a princess, and that her father's extensive
lands on the Missouri were daily becoming of
more and more consequence to his ambitious nation,
led him to think of marriage with her as a desirable object.
His eyes and his manner had said this, long before
the old chief began to suspect it; and he allowed

the wily Frenchman to twine himself almost as closely
around his heart, as he had around the more yielding
soul of his darling child.

Though exceedingly indolent by nature, Florimond
de Rancé had acquired skill in many graceful arts,
which excited the wonder of the savages. He fenced
well enough to foil the most expert antagonist, and
in hunting, his rifle was sure to carry death to the
game. These accomplishments, and the facility with
which his pliant nation conform to the usages of savage
life, made him a universal favorite, and at his request,
he was formally adopted as one of the tribe. But
conscious as he was of his power, it was long before he
dared to ask for the daughter of the haughty chief.
When he did make the daring proposition, it was received
with a still and terrible wrath, that might well
frighten him from his purpose. Rage showed itself only
in the swelling veins and clenched hand of the old
chief. With the boasted coldness and self-possession of
an Indian, he answered, `There are Sioux girls enough
for the poor pale faces that come among us. A king's
daughter weds the son of a king. Eagles must sleep
in an eagle's nest.'

In vain Tahmiroo knelt and supplicated. In vain she
promised that Florimond de Rancé would adopt all
his enmities and all his friendships; that in hunting,
and in war, he would be an invaluable treasure. The
chief remained inexorable. Then Tahmiroo no longer
joined in the dance, and the old men noticed that her
rich voice was silent, when they passed her wigwam.
The light of her beauty began to fade, and the bright
vermillion current, which mantled under her brown
cheek, became sluggish and pale. The languid glance
she cast on the morning sun and the bright earth, entered
into her father's soul. He could not see his

beautiful child thus gradually wasting away. He had
long averted his eyes, whenever he saw Florimond de
Rancé; but one day, when he crossed his hunting
path, he laid his hand on his shoulder, and pointed to
Tahmiroo's dwelling. Not a word was spoken. The
proud old man, and the blooming lover entered it together.
Tahmiroo was seated in the darkest corner of
the wigwam, her head leaning on her hand, her basket
work tangled beside her, and a bunch of flowers, the
village maidens had brought her, scattered and withering
at her feet. The chief looked upon her, with a vehement
expression of love, which none but stern countenances
can wear. `Tahmiroo,' he said, in a subdued
tone, `go to the wigwam of the stranger, that your
father may again see you love to look on the rising sun,
and the opening flowers.' There was mingled joy and
modesty in the upward glance of the `Startled Fawn'
of the Sioux; and when Florimond de Rancé saw the
light of her mild eye, suddenly and timidly veiled by its
deeply fringed lid, he knew that he had lost none of his
power.

The marriage song was soon heard in the royal
wigwam, and the young adventurer became the son of
a king.

Months and years past on, and found Tahmiroo
the same devoted, submissive being. Her husband
no longer treated her with the uniform gallantry of a
lover. He was not often harsh; but he adopted something
of the coldness and indifference of the nation he
had joined. Tahmiroo sometimes wept in secret; but so
much of fear had lately mingled with her love, that she
carefully concealed her grief from him who had occasioned
it. When she watched his countenance, with
that pleading, innocent look, which had always characterized
her beauty, she sometimes would obtain a glance

such as he had given her in former days, and then her
heart would leap like a frolicsome lamb, and she would
live cheerfully on the remembrance of that smile, through
many wearisome days of silence and neglect. Never
was woman, in her heart breaking devotedness, satisfied
with such slight testimonials of love, as was this gentle
Sioux girl. If Florimond chose to fish, she would herself
ply the oars, rather than he should suffer fatigue;
and the gaudy canoe her father had given her, might
often be seen gliding down the stream, while Tahmiroo
dipped her oars in unison with her soft, rich voice, and
the indolent Frenchman lay sunk in luxurious repose.
She had learned his religion; but for herself she never
prayed. The cross he had given her was always raised
in supplication for him; and if he but looked unkindly
on her, she kissed it, and invoked its aid, in agony of
soul. She fancied the sounds of his native land might
be dear to him, and she studied his language with a
patience and perseverance to which the savage has seldom
been known to submit. She tried to imitate the
dresses she had heard him describe; and if he looked
with a pleased eye on any ornament she wore, it was
always reserved to welcome his return. Yet, for all
this lavishness of love, she asked but kind, approving
looks, which cost the giver nothing. Alas, for the perverseness
of man, in scorning the affection he ceases
to doubt! The little pittance of love for which poor
Tahmiroo's heart yearned so much, was seldom given.
Her soul was a perpetual prey to anxiety and excitement;
and the quiet certainty of domestic bliss was
never her allotted portion. There were, however, two
beings, on whom she could pour forth her whole flood
of tenderness, without reproof or disappointment. She
had given birth to a son and daughter, of uncommon
promise. Victoire, the eldest, had her father's beauty,
save in the melting dark eye, with its plaintive expression,
and the modest drooping of its silken lash. Her cheeks
had just enough of the Indian hue to give them a warm,
rich coloring; and such was her early maturity, that at
thirteen years of age, her tall figure combined the
graceful elasticity of youth, with the staid majesty of
womanhood. She had sprung up at her father's feet,
with the sudden luxuriance of a tropical flower; and her
matured loveliness aroused all the dormant tenderness
and energy within him. It was with mournful interest
he saw her leaping along the chase, with her mother's
bounding, sylphlike joy; and he would sigh deeply
when he observed her oar rapidly cutting the waters of
the Missouri, while her boat flew over the surface of
the river like a wild bird in sport—and the gay young
creature would wind round among the eddies, or dart
forward, with her hair streaming on the wind, and her
lips parted with eagerness. Tahmiroo did not understand
the nature of his emotions. She thought, in the
simplicity of her heart, that silence and sadness were
the natural expressions of a white man's love; but when
he turned his restless gaze from his daughter to her,
she met an expression which troubled her. Indifference
had changed into contempt; and woman's soul, whether
in the drawingroom or the wilderness, is painfully alive
to the sting of scorn. Sometimes her placid nature
was disturbed by a strange jealousy of her own child.
`I love Victoire only because she is the daughter of
Florimond,' thought she; `and why, oh! why does he
not love me for being the mother of Victoire?'

It was too evident, that De Rancé wished his daughter
should be estranged from her mother, and her mother's
people. With all members of the tribe, out of his own
family, he sternly forbade her having any intercourse;
and even there he kept her constantly employed in taking

dancing lessons from himself, and obtaining various
branches of learning from an old Catholic priest, whom
he had solicited to reside with him for that purpose.
But this kind of life was irksome to the Indian girl,
and she was perpetually escaping the vigilance of her
father, to try her arrow in the woods, or guide her
pretty canoe over the waters. De Rancé had long
thought it impossible to gratify his ambitious views for
his daughter, without removing her from the attractions
of her savage home, and each day's experience convinced
him more and more of the truth of this conclusion.

To favor his project he assumed an affectionate manner
towards his wife; for he well knew that one look or
word of kindness would at any time win back all her
love. When the deep sensibilities of her warm heart
were roused, he would ask for leave to sell her lands;
and she, in her prodigality of tenderness, would have
given him anything, even her own life, for such smiles
as he then bestowed. The old chief was dead, and
there was no one to check the unfeeling rapacity of the
Frenchman. Tracts after tracts of Tahmiroo's valuable
land were sold, and the money remitted to Quebec,
whither he had the purpose of conveying his children,
on the pretence of a visit, but in reality with the firm
intent of never again beholding his deserted wife.

A company of Canadian traders happened to visit
the Falls of St Anthony, just at this juncture, and
Florimond de Rancé took the opportunity to apprise
Tahmiroo of his intention to educate Victoire at one of
the convents in Quebec. The Sioux pleaded with all the
earnestness of a mother's eloquence; but she pleaded
in vain. Victoire and her father joined the company
of traders, on their return to Canada. Tahmiroo knelt
and fervently besought that she might accompany them.
She would stay out of sight, she said; they should not

be ashamed of her, among the great white folks at the
east; and if she could but live where she could see
them every day, she should die happier.

`Ashamed of you! and you the daughter of a Sioux
king!' exclaimed Victoire proudly, and, with a natural
impulse of tenderness, fell on her mother's neck, and
wept.

`Victoire, 't is time to depart!' said her father sternly.
The sobbing girl tried to release herself; but she could
not. Tahmiroo embraced her with the energy of despair;
for, after all her doubts and jealousies, Victoire
was the darling child of her bosom—she was so much
the image of Florimond when he first said he loved her.
`Woman! let her go!' exclaimed De Rancé, exasperated
by the length of the parting scene. Tahmiroo
raised her eyes anxiously to his face, and she saw that
his arm was raised to strike her.

`I am a poor daughter of the Sioux; oh! why did
you marry me?' exclaimed she, in a tone of passionate
grief.

`For your father's lands,' said the Frenchman coldly.

This was the drop too much. Poor Tahmiroo with a
piercing shriek fell on the earth, and hid her face in the
grass. She knew not how long she remained there.
Her highly wrought feelings had brought on a dizziness
of the brain; and she was conscious only of a sensation
of sickness, accompanied by the sound of receding
voices. When she recovered, she found herself alone
with Louis, her little boy, then about six years old.
The child had wandered there, after the traders had
departed, and having in vain tried to waken his mother,
he had laid himself down at her side, and slept on his
bow and arrows. From that hour Tahmiroo was
changed. Her quiet, submissive air gave place to a
stern and lofty manner; and she, who had always been

so gentle, became as bitter and implacable as the most
blood thirsty of her tribe. In little Louis all the strong
feelings of her soul were centered; but even her affection
for him was characterized by a strange and unwonted
fierceness. Her only care seemed to be to
make him like his grandfather, and to instil a deadly
hatred of white men; and the boy learned his lessons
well. He was the veriest little savage that ever let fly
an arrow. To his mother alone he yielded anything
like submission; and the Sioux were proud to hail the
haughty child as their future chieftain.

Such was the aspect of things on the shores of the
Mississippi, when Florimond de Rancé came among
them, after an absence of three years. He was induced
to make this visit, partly from a lingering curiosity to
see his boy, and partly from the hopes of obtaining more
land from the yielding Tahmiroo. He affected much
contrition for his past conduct, and promised to return
with Victoire, before the year expired. Tahmiroo met
him with the most chilling indifference, and listened to
him with a vacant look, as if she heard him not. It was
only when he spoke to her boy, that he could arouse her
from this apparent lethargy. On this subject she was
all suspicion. She had a sort of undefined dread that he
too would be carried away from her; and she watched
over him like a she wolf, when her young is in danger.

Her fears were not unfounded; for Florimond de
Rancé did intend, by demonstrations of fondness, and
glowing descriptions of Quebec, to kindle in the mind of
his son a desire to accompany him.

Tahmiroo thought the hatred of white men, which
she had so carefully instilled, would prove a sufficient
shield; but many weeks had not elapsed, before she
saw that Louis was fast yielding himself up to the
fascinating power, which had enthralled her own youthful

spirit. With this discovery came horrible thoughts
of vengeance; and more than once, she had nearly
nerved her soul to murder the father of her son; but
she could not. Something in his features still reminded
her of the devoted young
Frenchman who had carried
her quiver through the woods, and kissed the moccasin
he stooped to lace, and she could not kill him.

The last cutting blow was soon given to the heart of
the Indian Wife. Young Louis, full of boyish curiosity,
expressed a wish to go with his father, though he, at the
same time, promised a speedy return. He had always
been a stubborn boy; and she felt now as if her worn-out
spirit would vainly contend against his wilfulness.
With that sort of resigned stupor, which often indicates
approaching insanity, she yielded to his request, exacting,
however, a promise that he would sail a few miles
down the Mississippi with her, the day before his
departure.

The day arrived. Florimond de Rancé was at a distance
on business. Tahmiroo decked herself in the garments
and jewels she had worn on the day of her marriage,
and selected the gaudiest wampum belts for the
little Louis.

`Why do you put these on?' said the boy.

`Because Tahmiroo will no more see her son in the
land of the Sioux,' said she, mournfully, `and when her
father meets her in the Spirit Land, he will know the
beads he gave her.'

She took the wondering boy by the hand, and led him
to the river side. There lay the canoe her father had
given her when she left him for `the wigwam of the
Stranger.' It was faded and bruised now, and so were
all her hopes. She looked back on the hut, where she
had spent her brief term of wedded happiness, and its
peacefulness seemed a mockery of her misery. And

was she—the lone, the wretched, the desperate, and deserted
one—was she the `Startled Fawn' of the Sioux,
for whom contending chiefs had asked in vain? The
remembrance of all her love and all her wrongs came
up before her memory, and death seemed more pleasant
to her than the gay dance she once loved so well. But
then her eye rested on her boy—and, O God! with
what an agony of love! It was the last vehement
struggle of a soul all formed for tenderness. `We will
go to the Spirit Land together,' she exclaimed. `He
cannot come there to rob me!'

She took Louis in her arms, as if he had been a
feather, and springing into the boat, she guided it toward
the Falls of St Anthony. `Mother, mother! the
canoe is going over the rapids!' screamed the frightened
child. `My father stands on the waves and
beckons me!' she said. The boy looked at the horribly
fixed expression of her face, and shrieked aloud for
help.

The boat went over the cataract. Louis de Rancé
was seen no more. He sleeps with the `Startled Fawn'
of the Sioux, in the waves of the Mississippi! The story
is well remembered by the Indians of the present day;
and when a mist gathers over the Falls, they often say,
`Let us not hunt to day. A storm will certainly come;
for Tahmiroo and her son are going over the Falls of
St Anthony.'

ANGLING.

BY I. M'LELLAN.

BRYANT.

`There is no life so pleasant as the life of a well
governed angler,' exclaimed that experienced prince of
fishermen, old Izaak Walton. `The merchant may be
deprived of his merchandise, and the project of the
political calculator may be thwarted, and the endeavours
of the poor scholar baffled; but the happiness of the
fisher shall be perfect so long as there is plunder in the
standing pool or in the running brook.'

I delight exceedingly, in imagination, to accompany
that gentle old man abroad in his various rambles, and
listen to the enthusiastic panegyrics he is perpetually
bestowing upon the cunning art to which he was wedded;
and am most charmed with his fervor, when, after the
heat and dust of a midsummer day, he sits at the
threshold of the little inn he loved to frequent with his
gossips, and recounts the victories of his rod, while he
enjoys his smoking tankard of `nut brown ale,' with its
inseparable `burnt toast and roasted crab apple.'

He has drawn so delicious a picture of the contentment
and quietness of rural life, of the holy and subduing
influence which the contemplation of beautiful scenes
and quiet pursuits exercise upon the mind, that one is
tempted to renounce the ordinary bustle and business of
men, and assume the garb and the implements and the
demeanour of an angler.

I have not unfrequently, when under the spell of
this gray headed wizard, been lured away into the
wilderness,

Rejoicing to yield myself up entirely to the mysterious
and sombre influence of the place, sometimes reclined
upon a knoll of the yellow moss, I have contemplated
for hours the wonderful beauty and perfection of the
heavens above, and the profound repose and harmony
of the earth around, regarding with delight each individual
feature in the landscape. There is a sensation
of awe experienced in beholding the magnificent and
eternal rock, fissured and weather stained, presenting a
myriad of fantastic shapes, the broken precipice, the
slender pinnacle, and the shattered fragment, and a
thrill of pleasure, in tracing the gloomy and silent glen,
wandering up into the very heart of the hills far beyond
the stretch of the bewildered vision. It is also refreshing
to the eye to penetrate the mysterious depths of the
flood, and observe the motions of its innumerable tenants.
In some places the water lies as clear and transparent
as the noonday atmosphere, so that even the minute
pebbles and shells and sand drifts are disclosed; and in
other places, where the surface is somewhat obscured by
the shadows of the trees, the element rather resembles
the uncertain gloom of the autumnal twilight.

Thus my enthusiastic love for old Walton remained
unabated so long as I was content to feast upon his
`Ancient Treatise,' and bury myself among those pastoral
haunts which he had first taught me to admire;
but at length even these objects began to lose somewhat

of their interest, and I resolved to equip myself with all
that formidable apparatus so indispensable to the art, and
declare myself a sworn `brother of the rod.' Accordingly
the wicker basket, the tapering rod and line, and
cunning tackle were provided, and I opened my aquatic
campaign; not, however, without bearing about me, as
prime counsellor of the cabinet, my illuminated copy of
Walton, and consulting it carefully before venturing any
decisive movement. The day I had selected for my
expedition was precisely one of those quiet, temperate,
and somewhat clouded seasons, half shade, half shine,
which old Walton would not have exchanged for riches;
no, `not for much fine gold.' There was a little obscurity
in the atmosphere, that rendered gloomier the hollow
places underneath the banks where the trout are accustomed
to lurk; and at such times they are known to take
the bait most eagerly, because the gloom of the water
renders them less wary, less liable to detect the shadow
of the sportsman and the cheat of the fly bait. There
was a lazy motion in the southern wind, barely sufficient
to crisp the surface, without violently agitating the tranquility
of the water. Speaking of the wind, old Izaak
very curiously and quaintly remarks, that

I commenced my career by searching one of those
sluggish currents, whose perpetual drowsy murmur exercised,
oftentimes, a wonderfully narcotic influence upon
the senses even of the keen, determined Father of the
Rod himself. In places where its surface lay exposed
to the day, you might look down into its transparent
depths, and be almost persuaded that the reflected image
of the bird or the insect above it, is really a winged
tenant of the stream, so perfectly is every color that lies
on its wing reflected from the transparent mirror. How

delightful is the illusion that presents to the eye countless
images of the inhabitants of the air, apparently living
and sporting with the creatures of another element.
There is a surpassing beauty in such a scene, that
reminds one of those wonderful regions of fairy land, in
the tales of Eastern enchantment.

I secreted myself in an obscure, cunning little thicket,
at the rivulet side, and patiently awaited that happy
moment, when freak, or appetite should seduce some
devoted rover to my angle; but in vain. Not even a
knot of yellow and red liveried perch, whom I at first
contemned as prey too ignoble for my rod, appeared to
regard me with any degree of interest. The loitering
knaves even affected to despise my craftily fashioned
fly, the identical species of bait recommended by the
illustrious Walton himself, and represented by him as
absolutely irresistible to any honest fish. However, a
dastardly fear, I suspect, occasioned this unnatural indifference,
for I detected sundry wistful glances cast
by some of them at my deceitful fly, which incontestably
betrayed their inclination, though their timidity
prevented its gratification. It is now with shame and
confusion that I must confess my utter want of success;
for the perpetual drip, drip, dripping of the current completely
overpowered my senses, and the rod gradually
slid away from my relaxing grasp, and the sound of the
water course became fainter and yet fainter in my ear,
and the perception of surrounding objects more indistinct,
and at last I was completely wandering and lost
in `the Land of Dreams.'

And such is the history of my angling experience.
It is a very delightful thing to search the brook, and
capture the monarch of the stream, in your meditations
over that bewitching `Treatise' of the simple hearted
Izaak Walton. But, in good truth, it is a most

wearying and fruitless pastime; it is searching in vain
for `dainty trout' in our ill-stocked waters, to the total
discomfiture of one's equanimity, and the lamentable
ruin of expensive apparatus.

ASCUTNEY.

BY MRS A. M. WELLS.

TELLING THE DREAM.

BY W. G. CROSBY.

THE SISTERS.

It was on the thirtyfirst of December, 1779, that an
alarm of fire was given in Paris. It was soon ascertained
that one of the most distinguished convents was
in flames. The building was inhabited by about three
hundred nuns, many of them descended from families
of high rank. The greatest efforts were made to save
the lives of these unfortunate women. The governor
of Paris, with the chief magistrates, hastened to the spot;
but, as the fire began in the sleeping rooms of the nuns,
they were enveloped in flames before they were aware
of their danger. Horrible indeed was the scene. The
shrieks of the sufferers, mingling with the hoarse shouts
of the populace—the shadowy forms of the nuns seen
tottering upon the rafters, stretching out their hands for
aid that no human power could afford them—then all at
once sinking among the crash of ruins, was too dreadful
to gaze upon. Dismay took possession of the spectators,
and when the last wing of the building fell, a suppressed
murmur of horror arose from the multitude, followed by
a profound silence.

It was many days before the impression of this scene
wore away from the minds of the restless and busy
Parisians. Accounts were published of the victims who
had perished, and the few who were saved were received
into other convents. Among the sufferers was
Theresa de Sèligny, a young lady of high birth. Her
fate excited the deepest interest in the circle in which
she had moved, and even the thoughtless and hard hearted
gave a sigh to her memory.

It is well known how often, in former times, the
younger sisters of families have been sacrificed to the
splendid establishment of the first born. Theresa was
one of these distinguished beings. She was taught
from her infancy that the honors and wealth of the
family were to centre in her; that at a suitable age she
was to be allied to the young Marquis de Lucerne, who
was a descendant of kings, while Louise, her younger
and only sister, was told, in a manner equally peremptory,
that she was destined to take the veil.

It is not difficult to impress the minds of children,
and give to their future destiny almost the color of
fate. Theresa early assumed the state of a marchioness.
Though naturally of an amiable and gentle disposition,
the seeds of vanity and caprice were early sown, and
their usual fruits, arrogance and selfishness, sprung up.
Louise, on the contrary, lived in perfect retirement,
and already appeared like a devotee. Both of the sisters,
however, had been equally perverted by education,
and both were alike actuated by ambition. The one
dreamed of worldly honors, of dress, of jewels; of giving
the tone of fashion and elegance to all Paris; of
making the spacious Chateau de Lucerne, that seat of
ancient, and consequently somewhat gloomy grandeur,
of which at twenty she was to become the mistress, a
gay and modern court, over which she was to preside

as its imperial queen. The nun, too, dreamed of honors;
but they were to be won by renouncing the very
world that was to consummate her sister's splendor;
her path to glory was to be by sacrifice, by humiliation
and prayer; her crown to be a crown of thorns. Already
she looked forward to the supremacy of the convent,
to be the distinguished successor of the Lady
Abbess. Her rank, the influence of her parents, and
her own zeal, all promised distinction, and an ambition
not more purified than her sister's, though differently directed,
burnt in her heart.

In external appearance, nature had apparently suited
herself to their different vocations, but it is difficult to
say how much effect education and a habitual train of
thought may produce. `Train up a child' in the way
you mean he shall go, is a maxim of profound policy.
Theresa was brilliant and commanding; Louise delicate
and shrinking. Thus far the plans of the parents had
been peculiarly successful. Their eldest born was all
they desired. When she appeared in public, at the
theatre, the opera, or the drawing room, she received
involuntary homage. At public gardens people clustered
to see her pass; but her parents were among the
most devoted of her worshippers. That fountain of affection
which springs up in the heart found but one
channel; Louise was scarcely thought of or regarded.
In her own apartment, which her youthful zeal had arranged
like the cell in which her future life was to be
passed, she counted her beads, said her pater nosters
and believed herself a saint, because she worshipped
the graven image of that being whose virtues while on
earth ought to have modelled her life.

With her sister's dreams of ambition, none of love
or domestic happiness mingled. She thought of the
young Marquis as one who was to pay her daily homage;

who was to die when she frowned, and come to
life again when she smiled. She was fully determined
to make her husband her prime minister; to consult his
taste where it was not decidedly opposed to her own,
and to do him credit by the arrangement of their splendid
establishment.

Such was the system Theresa had formed, when
the Marquis de Lucerne returned from his travels,
which were to give the last polish to his education.
It was now that the betrothed lovers met for the first
time. The young Marquis was evidently struck by the
beauty and elegance of Theresa. No timidity as to the
effect she might produce mingled with the lofty and dignified
manner in which she received him. It was as if
a queen might say to her followers, `I admit you among
my train!' Lucerne had been confined to no narrow
school of aristocracy. He had travelled on the continent,
and resided many months in England. He had
studied the genius of the nation, and above all, the genius
of man. The voice of liberty had burst forth in
America. He had been the associate of Pitt and of
Burke, and had learnt that there is a spirit in man,
which teacheth him inspiration. It was with a degree
of loathing that he thought of fulfilling a contract made
by his parents in the bondage of childhood, and he fully
determined to reserve to himself the liberty of decision.
When his eye, however, rested on Theresa, and he beheld
her in the brightness of her beauty, he forgot the
inalienable right of man to judge for himself, and felt
almost willing to yield his freedom.

A few days' intercourse, however, convinced Lucerne
that there was a wide contrast in their characters and
feelings. He grew impatient at her requirements, and
indignant at her caprices, and was often glad to quit

her presence, and wander forth into the solitude of the
garden.

It was in one of these walks that he perceived a door
in a wall standing open. He passed through it, and,
descending a few steps, found himself in a small apartment,
containing a table, a crucifix, a death's head, and
an hourglass; and prostrate before the altar lay a form
of living beauty and interest. He could not doubt that it
was Louise. He had never before seen her, and hardly
remembered that such a being existed. She appeared
to be performing some act of penance; for she groaned
bitterly, and her tears fell fast. He stood silent and
immoveable; but when she took a cross, armed with
innumerable points, and, opening her bosom, seemed
preparing to place it there, an involuntary exclamation
escaped his lips. Louise hastily dropped the instrument
of torture, and arose. The Marquis did not hesitate a
moment in his conviction, that the young lady before
him was the second born, and the destined nun. He
made some apology for his accidental intrusion, but
begged that he might no longer be a stranger to one so
nearly connected with the family.

`Allow me,' said he, `sometimes the pleasure of
your society.'

`My time,' said she, in a low voice, `is short. I have
much preparation to make before I enter the year of my
noviciate. It would ill become me to form associations
that would drag my spirit to the earth. I remember
both you and my sister in my daily prayers.'

As she spoke, however, she quitted the little cell,
and, accompanied by Lucerne, walked slowly in the
pathway. It was sunset, and every object seemed fresh
from the hand of the Creator. The perfume of a
`thousand flowers,' of orange blossoms, acacias, and
sweet scented exotics, floated on the air.

`I cannot reproach myself,' said Lucerne with emotion,
`for interrupting your devotions in that narrow
cell; for here, in the temple of nature, the heart and
imagination must have but one direction.'

Louise mournfully shook her head. `It is there,'
said she, `lies my weakness. In a spot like this, it is
not the Creator, but his works, I adore. We are prone
to forget the First Cause, and rest only in realities; but
the time is near when I trust these struggles will be
over. I would gladly now shut out worldly objects in
the convent where my future pilgrimage is to be passed;
but I have promised Theresa, that I will spend the few
months with her previous to her marriage.'

`Is it,' exclaimed the Marquis with animation, `by
excluding the works of the Creator, that we can best
learn to love him? Is it in a narrow cell, and shut out
from the glorious light of day, that we feel most sensibly
the power of his presence?'

`Natural objects,' said Louise, `have their use; but
the effect of these on the mind is low and grovelling,
compared with the holy mystery of the cross, the incarnation,
and blessed sacraments of the church. It is not
by walking in orange or myrtle groves; it is not there
that we trace the sufferings of a crucified Redeemer.
It is prostrate before the cross to which he was nailed,
and in the depths of our own hearts, that we feel our
worthlessness, and find resolution to inflict upon ourselves
punishments that may mitigate the pains of purgatory.
Blessed Saviour of the world!' she exclaimed,
`may these eyes become sightless balls when they shall
be content to gaze on thy works, and forget thee in thy
passion and thy cross!'

Lucerne shuddered. It were a work worthy a human
being, thought he, to redeem a creature so noble from
the darkness of superstition. He intreated Louise to

mingle in her family circle, to give her friends the privilege
of conversing with her the short time they were to
pass together.

`It is inconsistent with my future vocation,' she replied.
`The mind is but too easily seduced by material
objects, and engrossed by worldly thoughts; and if it is
filled, where can God find a place. It is only,' she
continued, `quand Dieu trouve des vaisseaux vides, il y
verse libéralement ses bénédictions célestes.'

`At least,' said Lucerne, `it must be the office of
saints and angels to instruct the ignorant and benighted.
Cannot your benevolence find its exercise in this work?
Suffer me to come to your cell, and listen to your
instructions. What is so flattering to ambition as power
and patronage!'

The eye of Louise flashed with momentary brightness,
and its meek and disciplined expression was changed to
exultation. Lucerne marked the change of countenance,
and followed the advantage he had gained. She was
persuaded to suffer him to visit her cell at those hours
of the morning when the inhabitants of the chateau were
sleeping off the effects of late hours, and the dissipation
of the preceding evening. It was then that Lucerne
wandered forth, animated by the breath of morning, but
still more by the enthusiasm of his own heart, and by
benevolent affections that teach man the value of existence.
There was nothing clandestine in these visits.
They walked under the shade of the trees, and Theresa
was perfectly willing her lover should devote those hours
to her sister which she passed in oblivion; and it was
not till evening that she claimed his homage.

In the mean time, the zeal of Louise increased with
her hopes. The conversion of Lucerne became her first
object. For this she knelt before the crucifix, and
pressed it to her lips and her bosom. She forgot the

humbling sense of her own sins, that had so often
drawn tears of anguish from her eyes, and called for
self-inflicted torments. It seemed as if a new spirit
of martyrdom had seized her, and she was willing to
sacrifice even the care of her own salvation for the
redemption of Lucerne. Her countenance had lost the
pale, meek expression which had marked it from childhood.
Her eyes sparkled with unwonted vivacity, and
her cheek mantled with a bloom that threatened to rival
the artificial brilliancy of her sister's. Could Lucerne
be all this time ignorant of the workings of her mind?
Woman is born to be the dependant of man; to be
subjugated by his influence. They are the ministers of
her fate. The good, become her guardian angels; the
bad, instruments of torture.

The young Marquis could not be ignorant of his power,
but he followed the impulse of the moment, and
thought not of consequences. Louise no longer refused
to listen to the waterfall, because it discoursed eloquently;
to gaze on the distant prospect; to examine
the insect and the flower through the wonder working
microscope, or hear the melody of the birds. When
the mind once begins to exercise its reason, its progress
is rapid. The young recluse no longer worshipped a
God of monastic gloom. Her first consciousness of existence
seemed now like `the morning stars' when they
`shouted aloud and sang for joy.' One superstition after
another was gradually fading away, and though at
times she trembled at her own thoughts, yet she seldom
repaired to her beads or pater nosters to smother the
unholy intruders. It would have been happy for her
future peace if she could have received the simple and
sublime truths of religion from one qualified to impart
them. The vague and indeterminate observations of Lucerne
served rather to bewilder, than enlighten her mind.

It was at this time that the young Marquis received
a summons from his parents to hasten home on acaccount
of family arrangements, for which his presence
was necessary. The pride and caprice of Theresa had
become almost intolerable to him, and he determined to
inform his parents of his reluctance to the union, and
leave them to dissolve the contract they had formed.
When he took leave of her there was little emotion on
either side; but the young lady spoke of his return as a
circumstance not to be doubted. Indeed it probably never
entered the minds of either of the sisters that they
could avoid the destiny marked out for them from their
infancy. The parting between Lucerne and Louise
was of a more sentimental nature. For the first time
he pressed his lips upon the hand of the consecrated
vestal. She withdrew it as if it were a deadly sin,
while her trembling limbs almost refused to support her,
and bidding him farewell, hastened to her lonely apartment.

For many succeeding days, Louise, to a transient observer,
would have appeared the very model of devotion;
but Le Père François, who was the family confessor,
had marked her with a keener eye. He had seen the
effect which worldly interest had produced upon her
character, and he read in her tears and sighs, the struggles
of a rebellious spirit. It was now that mingling
compassion and severity, praise and reproof, he riveted
more firmly than ever, the fetters of superstition.

`My child,' he said, `thou hast proof in thy wanderings
that a convent is thy only ark of safety. Flee to it
as to thy strong hold. Let not another week pass over
thy head and find thee unsheltered from the storm!
Apostles, martyrs, and saints stand ready to receive
thee at the door of the sanctuary. Go and reap thy glorious
reward!'

It was in vain that Louise urged her promise to remain
with her sister till after her marriage; the confessor
was resolute, and the parents, prompted by a hint
from him, united their wishes to his. Theresa tenderly
loved her sister, and warmly disapproved the measure;
but though she had an habitual disregard for opinions
contrary to her own, she trembled to oppose the requirements
of one of the fathers of the church; and Louise,
with a heart clinging to earth, with those newly awakened
affections that first teach us the value of existance,
was doomed to pass the fatal threshold.

The Marquis, on his return to his parents, communicated
to them his unwillingness to ratify the contract
they had formed.

`It is impossible,' said he, `that there can be any
union between us. I love retirement and leisure; her
days are passed in company and dissipation. And then
again my whole soul revolts against the tyranny and
selfish ambition which dooms one sister to a living
grave, to aggrandize the other. Louise possesses in her
character all that might give grace to domestic life.
By allowing her her just and equitable rights, both
would be benefited.

It was in vain that Lucerne protested and reasoned.
His insinuations, which were only darkly hinted with
regard to the nun, filled his parents with horror. The
contract they considered one of honor, any violation of
which would bring disgrace upon their family; and the
only boon that the son could obtain, was the delay of
another year. He left this second negotiation to his
parents, almost hoping that the palpable indifference it
discovered might annul the treaty. But in ambitious
projects there are only a few prominent points. These
were still fair to the eye, and the parents, satisfied, on
both sides, that wealth, titles, and lands, would be unit

ed, considered the parties merely as appurtenances.
Theresa had been educated with the same views, and
neither reasoned nor thought on the subject. As to the
postponement of the marriage, it was to her a matter of
indifference.

In the mean time Louise entered on her noviciate at
the convent. This convent was one of the strictest
order; but the young novice exceeded all others in
zeal. Even the pious and exemplary Lady Abbess
viewed with astonishment her disregard of sleep and
food, and her voluntary penances. Every excitement
was presented to her mind by the enthusiastic fanatics.
She was compared to Saint Catharine, who was broken
on a wheel, and to a host of other saints, who died less
enviable deaths. It is not surprising, amidst this horrible
excitement, with her heart struggling with worldly
recollections, and her frame wasted by penance, that
her reason should have tottered on its throne. She began
to have strange and wild imaginations; sometimes
called herself the mother of God, the `adorable Marie;'
sometimes spoke of herself as Jesus Christ, and destined
to be bodily crucified a second time. The nuns listened
to the wanderings of her disordered mind as to
beatific visions. Such extraordinary sanctity could not
be concealed, even within the walls of a convent. The
sisters talked of her at the grate when their friends
came to see her, and it was not long before she was
announced as a convulsionnaire.[1]

The devotees who professed to be convulsionnaires, were
even at this period rare; for it required a fortitude in
the endurance of suffering almost beyond human nature.
Instances are recorded of feeble and delicate women,
who were actually nailed to the cross in imitation of
Jesus Christ, and remained in that situation three hours
and a half, enduring every species of torture. Others
had their clothes burnt on them, and the fire only extinguished
when life was in imminent danger.

It was in the beautiful province of Languedoc, where
Lucerne was passing a few weeks, that he took up
a journal containing an account of the `extraordinary
piety of the young novice Louise de Sèligny, and second
daughter of the noble house of Montserrat, who was to
exhibit as a convulsionnaire before a few distinguished
friends, on the twelfth day of the ensuing month, about
the time of the holy incarnation.' It was with emotion
amounting to horror, that he read this paragraph. The
year of procrastination had nearly expired, and he did
not hesitate a moment to return to Paris. He determined
to make one effort to rouse the sensibility of
Theresa towards her sister, and to persuade her to
reject the sacrifice her parents exacted. It was now that
he found, under a thoughtless and dissipated exterior,
a feeling heart. The young lady entered warmly into
his project, which was to persuade her sister solemnly
to protest against taking the vows, even at the altar, if
necessary, and to relinquish to her a part of her splendid
fortune. The plan was to be kept secret from the
parents, that no measures might be taken to defeat it.
The most difficult part to accomplish, however, was to
persuade Louise herself to renounce a monastic life.
This Lucerne had not foreseen; for he knew not that,
since his departure, her former impressions had returned
with tenfold strength. He spent hours at the grate

endeavouring to shake her resolution; but all he could
obtain was the promise that she would not exhibit as a
convulsionnaire, though he could not doubt that her self-inflicted
torments were already unsettling her mind, and
destroying her health.

Theresa, with generous feelings, devoted a portion of
that time to her sister, which had been hitherto wasted
upon dress and fashion. It needs but one strong bond of
union to connect two young people, thrown together by
circumstances. Lucerne had discovered that Theresa
had an affectionate heart. A thousand virtues and good
qualities, some real, and some imaginary, opened upon
his view. He became now as earnest to fulfil the contract
as he had formerly been to annul it, and preparations
were made for the splendid alliance. The time,
too, rapidly approached, in which the fate of Louise
was to be decided. The week preceding the marriage
of one sister, was appointed for the other to take the veil.
It was now that both Theresa and Lucerne exerted all
their powers of reasoning and persuasion to induce
Louise to protest against the vows. She had ceased to
oppose their earnest solicitations, and either maintained
an obstinate silence on the subject, or let fall ambiguous
phrases, that startled and astonished them.

The night previous to the day which was to decide
her fate, Theresa declared her intention of passing with
her. She was sanguine in the belief that they had won
her to their wishes. Lucerne parted with the sisters at
the refectoire of the convent. Never had either looked
so lovely to him; Louise, pale and emaciated, but her
eyes sparkling with supernatural brightness; Theresa,
resplendent in beauty; the one clad in the simple
white robes of a novice; the other sparkling in jewels
and adorned with the drapery of fashion. He embraced
Theresa, and would have embraced Louise; but she

said, with an air of wildness that chilled him, `Touch
me not! I have not yet ascended—.'

It was on that night, that dreadful night, that the
fire broke out in the convent. It began near the cell
of the sisters, and their names were first among the
victims!

The parents of these unfortunate girls retired to one
of their splendid chateaux, and the world ceased to talk
of them.

Lucerne felt this event most deeply, and for many
months he avoided Paris. On his return to the city,
he was one day accosted by a friar, whom he recognised
as the Confessor of the family of Montserrat. The
venerable Father seemed oppressed by recollections too
dreadful to be borne, as he gazed mournfully upon the
young Marquis. He then hastily put a paper into his
hand, and disappeared. It was dated the 31st, the night of
the dreadful fire, and written by Louise. It was wandering
and unconnected, and like the ravings of a maniac.
She declared herself `appointed to consume the world
by fire; that the hour was come!' From the dark and
unconnected sentences more might be inferred than
met the eye. Lucerne, filled with horror, pursued the
investigation no further. Silence and mystery rested
on the memory of the maniac.

THE BRUCE'S HEART.

BY THE AUTHOR OF `MORAL PIECES.'

THE LEGEND OF BETHEL ROCK.

In the picturesque State of Connecticut, there is not
a spot more beautiful than the village of Pomperaug.
It is situated not very far from the western border of
the State, and derives its name from a small tribe of
Indians, who once inhabited it. It presents a small, but
level valley, surrounded by hills, with a bright stream
rippling through its meadows. The tops of the high
grounds which skirt the valley, are covered with forests,
but the slopes are smooth with cultivation, nearly
their summits. In the time of verdure, the valley shows
a vividness of green like that of velvet, while the forests
are dark with the rich hues, supposed to be peculiar to
the climate of England.

The village of Pomperaug consists now of two
hundred houses, with three white churches, arranged
on a street which passes along the eastern margin of
the valley. At the distance of about forty rods from
this street, and running parallel to it for nearly a mile,
is a rock, or ledge of rocks, of considerable elevation
From this, a distinct survey of the place may be had,
almost at a glance. Beginning at the village, the
spectator may count every house, and measure every
garden; he may compare the three churches, which now
seem drawn close together; he may trace the winding
path of the river by the trees which bend over its
waters; he may enumerate the white farm houses which
dot the surface of the valley; he may repose his eye on
the checkered carpet which lies unrolled before him,
or it may climb to the horizon over the dark blue hills
which form the border of this enchanting picture.

The spot which we have thus described, did not long
lie concealed from the prying sagacity of the first settlers
of the colony of New Haven. Though occupied
by a tribe of savages, as before intimated, it was very
early surveyed by more than one of the emigrants. In
the general rising of the Indians in Philip's War, this
tribe took part with the Pequods, and a large portion
of them shared in their destruction. The chief himself
was killed. His son, still a boy, with a remnant of his
father's people, returned to their native valley, and
lived for a time on terms of apparent submission to
the English.

The period had now arrived when the young chief
had reached the age of manhood. He took, as was
the custom with his fathers, the name of his tribe, and
was accordingly called Pomperaug. He was tall, finely
formed, with an eye that gleamed like the flashes of a
diamond. He was such an one, as the savage would
look upon with idolatry. His foot was swift as that of
the deer; his arrow was sure as the pursuit of the
eagle; his sagacity penetrating as the light of the sun.

Such was Pomperaug. But his nation was passing
away, and but fifty of his own tribe now dwelt in the
valley in which his fathers had hunted for ages. The day
of their dominion had gone. There was a spell over the
dark warrior. The Great Spirit had sealed his doom.
So thought the remaining Indians in the valley of
Pomperaug, and they sullenly submitted to a fate which
they could not avert.

It was therefore without resistance, and, indeed, with
expressions of amity, that they received a small company
of English settlers into the valley. This company
consisted of about thirty persons, from the New Haven
colony, under the spiritual charge of the Reverend Noah
Benison. He was a man of great age, but still of uncommon

mental and bodily vigor. His years had passed
the bourne of three score and ten, and his hair was
white as snow. But his tall and broad form was yet
erect, and his cane of smooth hickory, with a golden
head, was evidently a thing `more of ornament than use.'

Mr Benison had brought with him the last remnant
of his family. She was the daughter of his only son,
who, with his wife, had slept many years in the tomb.
Her name was Mary, and well might she be the object
of all the earthly affections which still beat in the bosom
of one, whom death had made acquainted with sorrow,
and who but for her had been left alone.

Mary Benison was now seventeen years of age. She
had received her education in England, and had been
but a few months in America. She was tall and slender,
with a dark, expressive eye, whose slow movements
seemed full of soul and sincerity. Her hair was of a
glossy black, parted upon a forehead of ample and
expressive beauty. When at rest, her appearance was
not striking; but, if she spoke or moved, she fixed the
attention of every beholder by the dignity of her air,
and the tone of tender, yet serious sentiment, which
was peculiar to her.

The settlers had been in the valley but a few months,
when some matter of business relative to a purchase of
land, brought Pomperaug to the hut of Mr Benison. It
was a bright morning in autumn, and while he was
talking with Mr Benison at the door, Mary, who had
been gathering flowers in the woods, passed by them
and entered the hut. The eye of the young Indian
followed her with a gaze of entrancement. His face
gleamed as if he had seen a vision of more than earthly
beauty. But this emotion was visible only for a moment.
With the habitual self-command of a savage, he turned

again to Mr Benison, and calmly pursued the subject
which occasioned their meeting.

Pomperaug went away, but he carried the image of
Mary with him. He retired to his wigwam, but it did
not please him. He went to the top of the rock, at the
foot of which his hut was situated, and which now goes
under the name of Pomperaug's Castle, and looked
down upon the river, which was flashing in the slant
rays of the morning. He turned away, and sent his
long gaze over the checkered leaves of the forest, which,
like a sea, spread over the valley. He was still dissatisfied.
With a single leap he sprang from the rock,
and, alighting on his feet, snatched his bow and took the
path which led into the forest. In a few moments he
came back, and, seating himself on the rock, brooded
for some hours in silence.

The next morning Pomperaug repaired to the house
of Mr Benison to finish the business of the preceding
day. He had before signified an inclination to accede
to the terms proposed by Mr Benison, but he now started
unexpected difficulties. On being asked the reason,
he answered as follows:—

`Listen, father—hear a red man speak. Look into
the air and you see the eagle. The sky is his home,
and doth the eagle love his home? Will he barter it
for the sea? Look into the river, and ask the fish that
is there, if he will sell it? Go to the dark skinned
hunter and demand of him if he will part with his forests?
Yet, father, I will part with my forests, if you
will give me the singing bird that is in thy nest.'

`Savage,' said the pilgrim, with a mingled look of
disgust and indignation, `will the lamb lie down in the
den of the wolf? Never! Dream not of it—I would sooner
see her die! Name it not.' As he spoke he struck
his cane forcibly on the ground, and his broad figure

seemed to expand and grow taller, while his eye gleamed,
and the muscles of his brow contracted with a lowering
and angry expression. The change of the old man's
appearance was sudden and striking. The air and
manner of the Indian, too, was changed. There was
now a kindled fire in his eye, a proud dignity in his
manner, which a moment before was not there; but
they had stolen unseen upon him, with that imperceptible
progress, by which the dull colors of the snake,
when he becomes enraged, are succeeded by the glowing
hues of the rainbow.

The two now parted, and Pomperaug would not
again enter into any negotiations for a sale of his lands.
He kept himself, indeed, aloof from the English, and cultivated
rather a hostile spirit in his people toward them.

As might have been expected, difficulties soon grew
up between the two parties, and violent feelings were
shortly excited on both sides. This soon broke out
into open quarrels, and one of the white men was shot
by a savage, lurking in the woods. This determined
the settlers to seek instant revenge, and accordingly
they followed the Indians into the broken and rocky
districts which lie east of the valley, whither, expecting
pursuit, they had retreated.

It was about an hour before sunset, when the English,
consisting of twenty well armed men, led by their reverend
pastor, were marching through a deep ravine, about
two miles east of the town. The rocks on either side
were lofty, and so narrow was the dell, that the shadows
of night had already gathered over it. The pursuers
had sought their enemy the whole day in vain,
and having lost all trace of them, they were now returning
to their homes. Suddenly a wild yell burst from
the rocks at their feet, and twenty savages sprang up
before them. An arrow pierced the breast of the pilgrim

leader, and he fell. Two Indians were shot, and
the remainder fled. Several of the English were wounded,
but none mortally, save the aged pastor.

With mournful silence they bore back the body of
their father. He was buried in a sequestered nook of
of the forest, and with a desolate and breaking heart,
the orphan Mary turned away from his grave, to be for
the first time alone in their humble house in the wilderness.

A year passed. The savages had disappeared, and
the rock, on which the pilgrim met his death, had
been consecrated by many prayers. His blood was
still visible on the spot, and his people often came with
reverence to kneel there, and offer up their petitions.
The place they called Bethel Rock, and piously they
deemed that their hearts were visited here with the
richest gifts of heavenly grace.

It was a sweet evening in summer, when Mary
Benison, for the last time, went to spend an hour at this
holy spot. Long had she knelt, and most fervently had
she prayed. Oh! who can tell the bliss of that communion,
to which a pure heart is admitted in the hours
of solitude and silence. The sun went down, and as
the veil of evening fell, the full moon climbed over the
eastern ledge, pouring its silver light into the valley,
and Mary was still kneeling, still communing with Him
who seeth in secret.

At length a slight noise, like the crushing of a leaf,
woke her from her trance, and with quickness and agitation
she set out on her return. Alarmed at her distance
from home at such an hour, she proceeded with
great rapidity. She was obliged to climb up the face
of the rocks with care, as the darkness rendered it a
critical and dangerous task. At length she reached

the top. Standing upon the verge of the cliff, she then
turned a moment to look back upon the valley. The
moon was shining full upon the vale, and she gazed
with a mixture of awe and delight upon the sea of silvery
leaves, which slept in deathlike repose beneath
her. She then turned to pursue her path homeward,
but what was her amazement to see before her, in the
full moonlight, the tall form of Pomperaug! She
shrieked, and swift as his own arrow, she sprang over
the dizzy cliff. The Indian listened—there was a moment
of silence—then a heavy sound—and the dell was
still as the tomb.

The fate of Mary was known only to Pomperaug.
He buried her with a lover's care amid the rocks of the
glen. Then bidding adieu to his native valley, he joined
his people, who had retired to the banks of the Housatonac.

More than half a century subsequent to this event,
a rumor ran through the village of Pomperaug, that
some Indians were seen at night, bearing a heavy burthen
along the margin of the river, which swept the
base of Pomperaug's castle. In the morning a spot was
found near, on a gentle hill, where the fresh earth showed
that the ground had been recently broken. A low heap
of stones on the place, revealed the secret. They remain
there to this day, and the little mound is shown
by the villagers as Pomperaug's grave.

COLUMBUS.
HIS LAST EMBARKMENT FROM THE NEW WORLD, A CAPTIVE.

BY J. W. MILLER.

THE CONSCRIPT BROTHERS.

It was in the dark and smoky room of an alehouse,
the walls stained by the dirt of years, that three young
men were seated at a table. Their coarse and scanty
meal stood untasted before them. Their muskets rested
against the wall and their knapsacks lay on the floor.
The storm beat furiously against the window. The rain
had penetrated through the dilapidated building, and
gave a still more desolate appearance to the miserable
apartment.

It was the evening before the battle of Waterloo.
A terrible conflict was expected. Many a soldier of
Bonaparte's army was fired by the prospect, and waited
with all the impatience of military ardor for morning
to arrive.

Not so our young Conscripts. They had been torn
by the imperial mandate from the bosom of their family,
from the culture of the sunny vineyard, from the tranquil
and simple pleasures that the paysans of France
enjoy, and forced into military duty. There was no
struggle for freedom to animate them; no anticipation
of better days. Their little village had been desolated
by their own countrymen, and their father robbed of his
three sons by the most cruel despotism. They could
not join in the shout of Vive l'Empereur! for they felt
only the effects of his blasting and selfish ambition.

`Our poor father!' said Conrad, striking his hand on
the table.

`Our poor sister!' said Philip, while Edward, the
youngest, who yet retained the slight form and fair
complexion of boyhood, uttered a convulsive sob.

`Cheer up, my boy,' said Conrad, `if we must fight,
let us fight like men, and die like Christians.' At that
moment the landlord entered, conducting a soldier.

`Who talks of dying?' exclaimed he, as, full of animation
and gaiety, he seated himself at the table; then,
casting his eyes around, `for shame! landlord,' said he,
`can you give the defenders of your country no better
rations than these? Do you not boast of your generous
wines? Bring them forth! Don't stint us of Burgundy
and Champaigne. Well may these poor fellows
talk of dying, when famine and thirst stare them in the
face.'

The landlord, who had long groaned under the
heavy demands of those who had quartered upon him,
muttered his dissatisfaction.

`Away!' exclaimed the soldier, `do you not know
you have the honor of entertaining Fortunatus himself?
Now look! whenever I take off my cap and shake it

thus, wealth pours from it;' and several pieces of
money actually fell upon the table.

`God bless your honor,' exclaimed the landlord;
`may you often take it off in my house.'

`Go, then, poor devil,' said the soldier, throwing him
a few francs, `and bring us the best you can find.'

The landlord bowed low and disappeared. `I do in
my very soul pity these poor fellows,' said the soldier,
turning to his comrades; `they are oppressed by the
soldiery, and obliged to entertain and feed them without
recompense, and get nothing but curses in return, which
it must be acknowledged,' said he, again surveying the
table, `such fare deserves.'

It was not long before things wore a different aspect.
The bright and sunny hue of the stranger's mind began
to illumine even the dismal room of the alehouse. The
landlord spread a much better repast upon the table,
and, in honor of Fortunatus, placed a second smoky
lamp directly before him. As the light glared upon his
youthful and manly countenance, Edward suddenly
arose and seized his hand.

`Brothers,' said he, `this is the very soldier who
saved me from disgrace yesterday, when the dragoon
stood over me.'

`Ah! is it you, my brave fellow?' exclaimed his protector;
`it was your own mettle that saved you, for if
you had not shown that honor was dearer than life, you
might have been thrashed like a poltroon for all me.
But come!' added he, filling the glasses round, and not
forgetting the obsequious landlord, `we are all a peg
too low!'

Glass after glass exhilarated the company, and the
eyes of the young Conscripts began to sparkle.

`I wish,' said Conrad, as he felt his blood warm,
`that I went heart and hand in this cause.'

`Poh!' said the new comer, `it is not for us to reason.
We have nothing to do but fight. Let us drink Vive
l'Empereur!

`I cannot,' said Conrad; `my father is a royalist.'

`Well, then,' exlaimed the good natured soldier, `let
us drink to the girl we love best! Come!' said he to
Edward, who had filled his glass, `give us her name.'

`My sister Alice,' replied Edward, with animation.

A shout of laughter from the soldier abashed the
youth. `I don't care for any other girl,' said he, coloring
deeply.

`It is true,' said Conrad; `he is a mere boy. He has
always been brought up with his twin sister Alice.

`But come, Philip,' said he, turning with an arch expression
to his second brother, `you can help us out.'

The blushes of Philip were of a still deeper hue than
Edward's. At length, however, in a low voice he said,
`Lucile.'

The soldier had narrowly observed him. `By my
soul,' exclaimed he, `I believe you have all lived upon
mother's milk, and just escaped from the nursery.'

`I hope,' said Conrad, proudly, `you will see that we
do not shrink from our duty tomorrow.'

`In the mean time,' said the soldier, `let us all drink
a bumper to our sister Alice.'

The brothers smiled. There was something in the
light hearted, fearless gaiety of the new comer that animated
their own spirits. They soon lost the reserve
and awkwardness of strangers, and conversed with ease
and freedom.

The father of the Conscripts, Jean de Castellon, inhabited
a cottage that had descended from sire to son
on the mother's side. It was one of those luxuriant
spots cultured by the breath of heaven. Yet Jean's
labor was not spared. All that patient industry requires

to give affluence and utility to natural beauty, he had
done. His barns opened their vast folding doors to receive
the harvest of autumn; his agricultural utensils
were of the best kind, and in the finest order, and no
traveller passed without remarking on the taste and
neatness of his dwelling.

The death of Jean's wife was the first calamity he
had experienced. He was several years older than she,
and had been a husband rather after the patriarchal order
than that of modern French gallantry. But though
he required great deference, it was willingly paid, and
nothing disturbed the harmony of their union. At her
death Jean had exercised the paternal care of father
and mother in an exemplary manner. His two oldest
boys were already able to assist his labors, and Edward
and Alice were his constant companions.

Years had passed in this tranquil state, and the
father daily felt his cares lightened by the aid of his
sons. It was at this period that a detachment of soldiers
entered the village for Conscripts. Their short
stay was marked by plunder, and they bore away in
triumph Jean's eldest born, Conrad. The succeeding
year Philip was marked out and enlisted as a soldier.
Edward still remained, nor did it enter the old man's
head that they could rob him of all; but when the decisive
battle was to be fought, when the best blood of
France was to be spilt like water, and Napoleon gleaned,
for the last desperate effort of his ambition, the hope
of the nation, then the father was deprived of all. Yet
still some form was preserved. No youth under sixteen
was to be forced into the service—Edward had
passed that age a few days before. The kind hearted
villagers exhorted Jean to make use of evasion. They
promised to stand by him; but when he was put upon
oath, he not only told the day, but the very hour of his

son's birth, and the only favor he could obtain, was,
that his two boys might fight side by side.

Such was the history of the Conscripts, nor was it uncommon.
A late historian says, `No distinction was
made. The son of the widow, the child of the decrepit
and helpless, had no right to claim exemption. Three
sons might be carried off in three successive years from
the same desolated parents. There was no allowance
made for having already supplied a recruit.'[2]

Fortunatus, now the companion of the brothers, was
no Conscript. He had voluntarily enlisted in the French
army, and he believed their arms invincible. He was
full of amusing anecdote, and assured them that he had
fought in several battles.

`I don't know how it is,' said he, `I don't love to fight
in cool blood; but when I heard the sound of the trumpet
and the drum, and the music of the cannon, it is a different
thing. I have never yet lost life or limb. From
my childhood I was called Fortunatus, because I have
been remarkable for my good luck; but my real name
is Frederic de Lancey.'

`I wish,' said Philip, thoughtfully, `I felt as secure
as you do, that only one of us would escape tomorrow
with life; but when I think of our poor father and sister
Alice, my heart dies within me.'

`If that is all, my dear boy,' said the soldier, `give
yourself no uneasiness. I never knew more than two
of a family shot in one battle; and the other may return
to comfort his father.'

A sudden thought seemed to strike Conrad. `Have
you a father?' said he to the soldier.

`No,' replied he, the expression of his countenance
suddenly changing; `my father died in my arms, and
left me without a relative in the world.'

`And yet you call yourself Fortunatus?' said Edward.

`And why not?' replied he; `was I not happy to
have been on the spot when my dear father breathed
his last? Oh, it was the most fortunate moment of my
life. I have no one now to mourn for me, and if I die
tomorrow I shall not draw a tear from a human eye.
I am without kindred, a citizen of the world, and may,
possibly, as I pass along, administer to the enjoyment
of my fellow beings, but I cannot diminish their happiness.'

`I am thinking,' said Conrad, `if we three should
fall, you might be a son to our father.'

`And a brother to Alice,' added Edward.

`Most willingly would I,' said the soldier; `but would
they receive me? Who will vouch for my character?'

`I will,' said Edward, with animation; `you stood my
friend because I was oppressed. I had no other claim
upon you. I will write an account of the whole affair
to my father. He is generous, and will confide in you.'

`And I,' said Conrad, `have a commission that will
prove you are no imposter. Look,' said he, `it is the
picture of my mother. I always wear it next my heart.
She was as good as an angel, and I feel as if no evil
could come where she is. You shall deliver this to
Alice, and tell her I sent it.'

`Be it so!' exclaimed De Lancey. `If I survive
you, I will seek out your father and offer my services.
If I die, I bequeath to the survivors my knapsack and
its contents. You will find a hundred Napoleons in it.
It is all I am worth, and now let us to bed and sleep
till morning.'

`Not yet,' said Conrad; `we must do all that is to be
done this evening. Good landlord! bring me pen and
ink, and you shall be our witness.' He then wrote—

The letter was sealed and directed to the father.
Then Conrad, taking the miniature, which was fastened
to his neck by a black ribbon, pressed it to his lips, and
his brothers did the same.

De Lancey was lodged in the room with the Conscripts.
In a few moments his breathing denoted that
he had sunk into that calm and tranquil sleep that belongs
to health of body and mind. Philip and Edward,
too, forgot for a while their gloomy presentiments, and
slept quietly. But not so Conrad. He felt a responsibleness

pressing upon him that he could neither avert nor
control. The rain continued to pour in torrents, and
the wind shook the miserable dwelling to its foundation.
Amid the tumult of the elements, the clattering of
horses' hoofs, the shrill notes of the trumpet, and the
heavy roll of the drum, might be distinguished. New
companies were entering the village, and the shouts of
Vive l'Empereur! still resounded in his ear. Conrad
gazed upon his sleeping brothers, and his soul
melted as he thought of them on the field of battle.

The morning dawned upon his unclosed eyes, when,
with that weariness, which seems almost like perverseness,
nature could resist no longer, and he fell into a
slumber. He was awakened by the voice of his brothers,
and, starting up, found De Lancey already gone. The
brothers gave each other a long and close embrace, and
hastened to their ranks.

The weather was yet unsettled. A thick mist enveloped
the country around, and as the armies approached
each other, neither friends nor foes could be
distinguished. It was not till late in the morning that
the clouds dispersed, and the sun broke forth in all its
splendor. The dense and heavy vapors separated, and
the clear blue sky was seen in distant perspective. At
length even the fleecy clouds rolled away, and all was
calm and tranquil in the heavens, forming a striking
contrast to the scene below. The two armies were engaged
in desperate contest. The once fertile valley
and vine covered hills lay blended by the smoke of the
cannon, and confused shouts rent the air.

How many mothers, widows, and orphans, have wept
for that day! How many beheld the `brave and beautiful'
go forth to battle! Years have passed away, and
memory still asks, `Where are they?' Amidst the tumult
of war one scene of private distress was passing.

Seated on a little hillock, and supporting his youngest
brother's head upon his lap, sat Conrad de Castellon.
His pale countenance and knit brow, discovered the
agony of his feelings. Nor was it wholly mental. His
leg had been shattered by a cannon ball, but it was
only of Edward he thought. `Oh! for a drop of water,'
he exclaimed, `one draught might save him!' But who
would stop in the full career of victory to administer
to the wants of one dying man, when thousands lay
around? The French army were in the full career of
victory. `On, on, to Brussels!' rung on every side.

`Is there no human aid?' said Conrad, and he rested
his brother's head against a prostrate soldier and strove
to rise; but it was impossible, and he fell back with a
groan and fainted. He was roused by the voice of De
Lancey. `Up, comrade!' said he, `the horse are advancing;
you will be trampled under foot.' Conrad
pointed to his disabled leg, and the lifeless boy that lay
before him. He was, indeed, lifeless. The spirit had
passed away, and the stiffness of death had succeeded to
the last pressure of his brother's hand.

`We can do nothing for him,' said De Lancey; `he
is gone. But I may save you,' and, taking the soldier
in his arms, he bore him to a place of safety, and laid
him on the turf.

`My brother! my poor Edward!' exclaimed Conrad,
`must he be trampled under foot?' Once more De
Lancey rushed back, seized the slight form of the Conscript,
and placed it by the side of his brother, then,
joining in the shout of `On, to Brussels! Vive l'Empereur!
mingled in the battle.

It was late at night when the soldier cautiously
sought the spot where he had left Conrad. He found
him still watching by his brother.

`I have secured a place for you in a wagon,' said
De Lancey. `You must go to the Hospital of St Catharine.
You will be taken good care of.'

`I cannot leave him,' said Conrad, still clinging to
his brother; `my poor Edward!'

`He is better off than we are,' said the soldier, `for
he does not live to see the disgrace of our army. All is
lost! And well it might be,' continued he, indignantly,
`when they forced boys like this from the arms of their
mothers;' and he parted the curls of his hair, and the
moon shone on his white forehead. `I pledge you my
honor,' continued he, `that I will see him buried where
vultures cannot reach him. I will convey you to the
wagon, and return to this spot again. Tomorrow I
will see you at the Hospital, where I hope to find you
doing well.'

Faithful to his promise, De Lancey joined him in the
morning. The surgeon had already passed judgment
on the wounded soldier. A violent fever had set in,
and amputation of the limb, which would have been his
only chance, would now hasten his end—he must die.

`Let it be so,' said Conrad, `my father will yet have
a staff for his age if Philip lives; if not, remember your
promise.'

De Lancey staid by his friend till he breathed his last,
and then took every means to ascertain whether Philip
had survived the battle. His inquiries proved fruitless,
but from several circumstances he felt sanguine in the
belief that he was not among the slain, and naturally
concluded he must have returned to his father. He regretted
that he could not have restored the picture to
him. `It will cost me a journey, now,' said he, `but I
will wait till Philip has been at home a few weeks.'
As time weakened his impressions his resolution grew
fainter; for, it must be confessed, Fortunatus was not

one of those that thought it good to go to `the house of
mourning.' He had, from his youth upward, been the
subject of perpetual change, and had seen death in too
many forms to be startled at it—but the tears of a father
and a sister he knew not how to encounter. A cloud
had obscured his brow for a few days after this event,
but it was soon dissipated, and he again became the
happy, light hearted Fortunatus.

With the gay and thoughtless, time passes unmarked.
It was nearly a year after the battle of Waterloo, when
De Lancey was travelling through the little village in
which he had been introduced to the Landlord of
`The Plucked Hen.' He stopped to pay him a visit,
but the host was changed. The room, the table, the
seats, all remained the same, and so forcibly called up
the recollection of his promise to the brothers, that his
conscience smote him for the delay. He went immediately
to visit Edward's grave. He had taken the precaution
to identify it by two Lombardy poplars, which
he had planted opposite, and twisted into an arch over
the grave. They were twigs that he had cut from a
neighbouring tree, but they had taken root, and were
now covered with foliage. The grass had grown over
the grave with a luxuriance that made the spot striking
from the desolation that still remained around it.

By sunrise De Lancey had proceeded many miles on
his way to Patière, where Jean de Castellon resided.
It would have been a long and weary foot journey for
one with less health and muscular strength; but it was
his favorite way of travelling, and, he was fully of opinion,
much less fatiguing than riding. And then, too, he
could stop when he pleased and converse with all the
good humored pleasant people he met, and make acquaintances
where he thought they were worth making.
Nothing, in fact, could be pleasanter than De Lancey's

mode of travelling. He was too much accustomed to
his knapsack to find it any burden, and he had provident
virtue enough to secure himself means for every
comfort a foot traveller could desire. His little modicum
had increased during the past year, and, though
in the thoughtless benevolence of his heart, he sometimes
gave a few francs injudiciously, yet he always
said, in some way or other, they brought back their full
interest.

When he entered Patière he inquired for the house
of Castellon, and was directed to a whitewashed cottage
surrounded by venerable trees. It was in the
month of June, and every shrub and flower was in its
first fragrance. An old man was sitting on a bench before
the door. De Lancey approached him with a
respectful air, and, taking off his hat, said, `Monsieur
de Castellon?'

`The same,' he replied.

`I would ask,' said the soldier, hesitatingly, `for
Philip.'

`And why for Philip?' said the old man, sternly,
`why not for Conrad, my eldest born, and Edward, my
youngest?' De Lancey made no reply. `Come,' said
he, `with me, and I will show you all I know of them.'

He arose from his seat and walked slowly to a little
wicker gate. He entered it and proceeded by a foot
path to a hillock planted with trees. The soldier followed
in silence. It was the family burying ground.
Three simple gravestones, with the names of the brothers
inscribed on each, were placed side by side. De
Lancey's question was answered. Philip had never
returned from the battle of Waterloo.

`I knew,' said he, with emotion, `the fate of Conrad
and Edward; but I had hoped Philip had escaped.'

`Not one,' said the father, clasping his hands, `not a
remnant was left.'

`I was a fellow soldier,' said De Lancey. `I was
quartered with them the evening before the battle.'

`A soldier in Bonaparte's army?' said the old man,
extending his hand. `Then you too are a Conscript?'

`No,' said De Lancey, `I was no Conscript. I enlisted
voluntarily.' The father withdrew his hand and
turned coldly away.

`I have a commission from your son Conrad,' said
De Lancey, `but it is for your daughter, and I must deliver
it to her.'

As they approached the house Alice met them at the
door. The sight of a soldier revived painful recollections,
and a cloud came over her bright and blooming
countenance.

De Lancey started at the strong resemblance she
bore to her twin brother. There was the same tranquil
expression of sweetness and innocence that had lingered
on his face, even after his death.

He put his hand into his bosom and withdrew the
miniature. `This,' said he, `I promised your brother
Conrad to deliver to you if I was the survivor.' Alice
took it, gazed upon it for a moment, and rushed into
the house.

The Father, with an air of authority, desired De
Lancey to come in. The soldier proceeded to inform
him of all the circumstances which related to the deaths
of his two sons. `Of Philip,' said he, `I know nothing.
When I last saw him he had received no injury, but
was in the heat of battle, and fighting with a bravery
worthy of Napoleon himself.'

`No more of that,' said the old man, with bitterness.
`You say,' continued he, `Conrad died in your arms.'

`He did,' replied the soldier, `and he had every comfort,
and the best of medical advice; and as for attendance,
it would not be becoming for me to say much
about that, but I never left him, night nor day, as long
as he lived. I could not have done more for him had it
have been the Emperor himself.'

The last words were uttered in a low voice, and
seemed to have escaped him without his consent. The
father, however, did not remark them.

`I hope,' said he `my son died like a good Protestant.'

`I don't know anything about that,' replied De Lancey,
`but I am sure he died like a Christian.'

`This is a Popish country,' said the old man; `I hope
he had no father confessors about his bed.'

`Not one—not a limb of them,' said the soldier.

De Castellon was a Swiss, and entertained a horror
of the Roman Catholic religion.

`You say,' said he, `that my poor Conrad died like
a Christian. Then he confessed his sins to his Maker,
and died in the fear of God.'

`I don't know,' said De Lancey, `what he might
confess, for that was an affair between his Maker and
himself; but as to fear, I saw nothing that looked like
it, for when he was dying he said, “I did not expect to
meet my dear Edward so soon, but I am going home,
after all.”'

`You must stay with us a few days,' said the old
man, his heart melting of the thoughts of his sons.

`Most willingly,' said De Lancey, `if you will give
me some employment. I do not love idleness, and
about a place like this, a pair of hands can't come
amiss.'

It was amusing to see with what facility the soldier
adopted the habits and employments of the farmer.
His services grew every day more and more important

to De Castellon. A treaty of amity seemed to be formed
between them, and Bonaparte was never alluded to
on either side. A sentiment of delicacy had prevented
De Lancey from delivering the letter of the brothers,
for he knew the contents, and that they related wholly
to himself.

The intercourse between Alice and the soldier was
friendly and confiding. He learned from her how he
could best assist her father in his labors, and how he
could be most useful to herself; and they soon ceased
to regard each other as strangers. His present mode
of life was to the soldier like a new existence. To exchange
the noise and bustle of a camp for the serenity
and stillness of the country; to feel his time and his
mind occupied without the feverish excitement of contest,
was alone delightful. But when, added to this, he
felt for the first time the power of woman, her innocent
and affectionate smile, the sanctity of her virtue, her
habitual sacrifices in the arrangements of domestic life,
and her habits of temperance, of order, and of purity,
he shrunk from the recollection of past scenes. This
feeling he expressed to Alice, whom he sportively called
his pet lamb, with his usual frankness.

`What a forlorn creature,' said he, `have I hitherto
been! I have had nothing to love or to watch over—I
can but just remember my mother—and yet, when my
head has been throbbing with pain, I have sometimes
wished I could lay it in her lap as I used to when I was a
child. But this was only the thought of a moment, and
I banished it as unmanly, for I only considered myself
ennobled by the ferociousness with which I fought for
my country.'

`Well,' said Alice, smiling, `I suppose you would
fight again if you could find a leader.'

`No,' he replied, `not if I can find employment any
other way. My views are changed. I have a thousand
associations which are new to me. I think I am going
back to childhood again. The flowers have the same
fragrance that they used to have when I was a boy,
and the world seems to me to be just created. I desire
no greater happiness than to live with you and your
father as I do now, and you have only to say the word,
and I will turn my sword into a pruning knife.'

It was by such language, uttered almost without
thought, that the young couple began to promise endless
faith to each other.

`But I am afraid,' said Alice, after an impassioned
burst of feeling from her lover, `that my father will
never consent to our being married.'

`And why not?' said the sanguine Fortunatus.
`Where can he find a more devoted son-in-law—one that
will do a harder day's work or raise a finer crop of wheat?
Besides, Alice,' said he, smiling affectionately, `you
have been bequeathed to me. I never would have told
you about the thing if you had not voluntarily given me
your heart, but now you shall know the whole.'

It was the first time he had alluded to the letter.
Alice listened to the explanation, without participating
in his sanguine expectations. She knew her father
was tenacious of his projects, and that he favored the
suit of her cousin Pierre.

With the confidence of a warm and generous heart,
De Lancey repaired to De Castellon with the sealed
letter in his hand. He took it and read it through, then
turned a steady eye on the soldier.

`Why have you not delivered it before?' said he.

`My motives,' replied De Lancey, `may not have
justified this delay; but I knew the contents of the letter,
and I knew, also, that I had no right to expect from

you the same confidence in a stranger that your sons
had felt.'

`And what has now altered the case?' said the father.

The soldier blushed deeply; `I don't know why I
should hesitate to speak,' said he. `It is the confidence
your daughter has placed in me. She has permitted me
to ask your consent to our union. I have something to
begin the world with. I have health and activity. I
will serve you with the fidelity and affection of a son,
and if, as it may be in the common course of nature,
Alice should be left alone with me, I will shield her
from every evil.'

The eagerness with which he spoke had prevented
his attending to the emotions that were struggling in
the old man's countenance.

At length he exclaimed, `I see it all. I am no longer
a dupe. My poor boys were victims to this fatal
legacy. Out of my sight! Away, wretch!'

`What does all this mean?' exclaimed the soldier,
with astonishment.

`Ask your own vile heart!' replied De Castellon.
`It seemed to me beyond the usual chances of war that
three sons should fall in one battle. But you could tell
us how it was; you could describe their last agonies,
and have now come to reap the reward of your treachery!'

De Lancey for a moment stood petrified. It was but
a moment.

`Old man,' said he, `were you my equal in age, or
were you any other than you are—but I do wrong to
reply. Farewell! we meet no more.'

Alice had repaired to a little arbor that her lover
had reared for her, and that was already covered with
the quick springing vines of a luxuriant climate, to
await the success of his communication. Many a foreboding

doubt assailed her mind when she cast her eye
upon his agitated countenance.

`I come,' said he, `to take leave of you forever.'

It was in vain that Alice intreated him to delay his
departure from the village.

`My father may relent,' said she. But he was resolute.

`Had it been common reluctance,' he replied, `I
would have borne with it. I would have crouched like
a slave for your sake; but to be suspected of the basest
of crimes! Alice, I wish not to shock you by repeating
what has passed. If your father tells you, I shall be
justified in your opinion. Farewell! dearest and best;
henceforth this world is a wilderness to me. I care not
which way I steer my course. With anguish I speak
it—we can meet no more.'

Bitter, indeed, was the parting. For the first time the
hitherto happy Fortunatus felt the true pang of sorrow.
The tenderness of friendship had refined and softened
his heart, and given it an unwonted susceptibility. Till
now he had met the evils of life with an unsubdued
spirit. He had faced danger and death in every form;
but the tears that he drew from Alice, and the affection
he had awakened in her bosom, were spells that changed
the life current of his heart.

With slow and lingering steps he quitted the village,
wholly unlike the being that had entered it three months
before, and inquired for the house of De Castellon.
Where was now his new born enthusiasm for every object
in nature? With a listless step he trod on the
sweet scented wildflowers as if they were the dry and
worthless leaves of autumn. He realized, as many have
done before, that it is the light of the mind that throws
over nature her verdant and prismatic hues; that gives
to the music of the birds its sound of gladness; to the

lofty cataract its thunder of eloquence, and to the murmuring
waterfall its sweet, low notes of sympathy.

It was not, however, in the constitution of the soldier
to cherish melancholy. When he first quitted the village,
with his heart swelling with anguish, and his head
throbbing with indignation, he felt as if all ties were
broken with the human race; but, as he walked slowly
on, his pulse beat more temperately. By degrees he
answered with something like gaiety to the greeting of
the peasants, who accosted him as he passed. The
feeling of mortification, which the horrible suspicions of
De Castellon had engendered, began to dissipate.

`He is an old man,' said he, `blasted and withered
by the breath of heaven; I will think of him no more.
But Alice! may I perish if I forget thee!'

For his future lot he had no anxiety. With his sword
he knew he could carve out a living, but the same sentiment
came over him that had operated with so many
of Napoleon's soldiers—`Wherefore should we fight?
We have no Emperor to fight for!' and he resolved to
quit France and seek his fortune elsewhere. There is
an energy, a feeling of resource, of mental power, that
is invincible. He who is born with the determination
to succeed, will realize that `nothing is impossible.'

Love, with men, is a recreation and a passion. With
women, it becomes a part of their existence. Let not
her, who has once given herself up to its reveries, hope
to break the spell that is wound around her. Sickness,
poverty, and age, may, to the eyes of others, render the
object worthless; but the sensibility of woman possesses
an alchemy that turns all to gold. It is in vain for
friends to reason, for the world to scoff—her destiny is
to love on.

Years had passed away. The head of the old De
Castellon was white with time. The youthful and girlish

figure of Alice had assumed the serious and maidenly
deportment of maturer life. Yet any one might
have seen that the rose on her cheek had withered before
its time. A paleness had settled there, but it
was the complexion of sentiment and thought; there
was nothing of the sickly hue of melancholy. Her
cousin Pierre had many times renewed his suit, and at
last had consoled himself with a less cruel fair one. All
Alice had asked of her father was to take care of him,
to be the comfort of his old age, and when that was
past to lay down beside her mother's grave, and have
strewed on her own, as was the custom of the village,
a few emblematic flowers as a token that the lowly tenant
had died in `single blessedness.'

The internal arrangements of the cottage retained all
their comfort and neatness; for though Alice had lost
some of the superfluous activity of youth, enough remained
for all the useful purposes of life; but the external
appearance had gradually changed. The hedges
were untrimmed, and implements of agriculture lay unsheltered
on the greensward before the door. The
hills and pastures were no longer crowned with luxuriance.
All looked as if the master's hand was wanting.

It was a cold evening in November that Alice and
her father were seated by the fire. There was an air
of comfort in the little apartment that female ingenuity
knows well how to give. The floor was covered with a
carpet of her own manufacture; and her father's arm
chair had been stuffed and rendered commodious by her
own contrivance. There was the debility of age and
sickness in his appearance, and a crutch lay beside him.
Alice read aloud or worked, alternately, as best suited
her father. She had just taken her book when the
sound of wheels stopping at the door arrested their attention.
A man hastily entered, and stood for a moment

gazing at the inhabitants;—then rushing forward,
he knelt before the old man, exclaiming, `My father!
my father!'

De Castellon was bewildered, but not so Alice. `It
is my brother!' she exclaimed, and hung upon his neck.
When the father began to comprehend the scene, that
it was, indeed, Philip restored to him, he inquired for
Conrad and Edward.

The countenance of Philip changed, and he said,
`I only am left to tell you.' In the same expressive
language the father replied, `Now then, let me die,
since I have seen the face of my son!'

Providence has wisely decreed that the sensibilities
of life should be blunted by age, and the effervescence
of feeling pass away. The old man became calm, and
at his usual hour desired Alice to read a chapter in the
Bible. Amid tears and sobs she read aloud, but every
word called forth the bursting emotions of her heart,
and her soul was kindled by living fire from the altar.
When she ceased, a low, fervent prayer from the lips of
the father followed, and then Alice performed her usual
office of putting him to bed, and was again at liberty to
throw herself into the arms of her brother. Their conversation
was long and deeply interesting. He told her
that after the battle of Waterloo he was conveyed
among the wounded to a small farm house, and found
that his life was considered worth preserving by the
English, among whom he now was; that when sufficiently
recovered he was put on board a small vessel
bound for the West Indies; that they were taken by
Spanish pirates, and himself with three others put on
shore on the coast of South America; that he had earned
by daily labor a pittance that kept him from starving,
but he had still to contend with weakness and depression.
`But now,' continued he, `Alice, comes the best

part of my story. I was one day working on the wharf,
when a vessel arrived and a young man sprung on
shore that I immediately recognized as a fellow soldier
at the battle of Waterloo.'

He stopped and looked earnestly at her; the blood
rushed to her cheeks.

`Yes, sister,' said he, fully comprehending her emotion,
`it was our friend Fortunatus. I learnt from him
all that had passed. From this moment I felt new energy;
my whole nature was changed. He loaded me with
kindness. You know his happy faculty of making
friends. Several of the officers, who had quitted France
and repaired to this country, recognised the brave and
warm hearted soldier. Fortune showered her gifts upon
him, and at the end of three years after our first meeting
we have returned once more; I, with little more
than I carried with me; but my companion rich enough
to purchase our whole estate, which, as it proved, we
unfortunately bequeathed to him.'

`Then he is in France?' said Alice, faintly.

`He is,' replied Philip, `and he loves you as well as
I can see you do him; but he will not come here. He
cannot forgive my father for his horrible suspicion.'

`Then he does not love as I do,' said Alice, ingenuously,
`or all would be forgiven.'

`No, Alice,' replied Philip, `men never love as women
do. They have various motives which operate; but next
to his country and his honor, a man may love his mistress.'

`I am afraid you have forgotten poor Lucile,' said
Alice, reproachfully.

`Perhaps she has forgotten me,' replied Philip.

`Oh! no,' said Alice, `it was but the other day she
came up here and sat down by your grave stone, and
wept bitterly, and said she never should forget you.'

`Well,' replied Philip, `I have returned the visit, for
I called to see her on my way here, and informed her
that I was alive and well.'

`I see,' said Alice, smiling, `you were right. A man
may love his mistress next to his country, and his honor
before father or sister. But tell me, my dear brother,
how could you remain so long in a strange country,
away from us, and not send us word you were living.'

`As to remaining there,' said Philip, `there was not
much choice in the business. I was taken up on suspicion,
and had to work with a chain round my leg; and
what good would it have done you to know the miserable
condition of your brother? After the arrival of De
Lancey, his plan was best, that we should return together
as soon as he had accomplished the object of his
voyage.'

It was not difficult for the young people to persuade
the father, humbled as he was by years, infirmities, and
sorrows, how much he had mistaken the character of
the soldier. An acknowledgement was all that De
Lancey asked, and it was no sooner sent than he hastened
to the spot. There is little more to add. He
purchased a neat cottage about half a mile from the
family mansion. It was arranged with simplicity and
good taste. The same marriage ceremony united Lucile
and Philip, and De Lancey and Alice; but their residence
was changed. Alice resigned her station to
Lucile, and removed to the home her husband had prepared
for her.

The two cottages may yet be seen embowered in
honeysuckle and grape vines. Before the doors are
often sporting rosy faced children, and Alice has given
to her two eldest boys, Conrad and Edward, the names
of her Conscript Brothers.

SACHEM'S HILL.

[This is a very small hill, on the sea shore, in the town of Quincy.
It is shaped like an Indian arrow head, as its original name, Masentusett,
in their language indicates; Mas, meaning arrow head, and
entusett, hill. From this spot, Boston and its vicinity, from the Blue
Hills to the rocks of Nahant, rise upon the view like a panorama. It
was the abode of the principal Sachem when the English first arrived
here. He was a friendly old man, and sold them corn and
land. Soon after their arrival an epidemic appeared among the
Indians, and in a short time nothing was left of them but the few
remains that are still found of their simple implements of war and
agriculture, and the name of this hill, that was given, with a slight
alteration, to our state.]

THE FRONTIER HOUSE.

BY THE AUTHOR OF `NORTHWOOD.'

`I shall return before dark,' said Edward Abbot
to his young wife, as he kissed their boy, and laid it in
her arms. `There is no danger, Rebecca.'

`But my dream of those frightful savages, Edward,'
said she.

`Oh! that should not frighten you,' he replied. `Remember
you had been hearing Indian stories all the
evening, and the wise man says, “a dream cometh
through the multitude of business,” which our good Mr
Walker explains as meaning whatever most engrosses
our thoughts, particularly just before we fall asleep.
There have not been any traces of the savages discovered
this season, and I should be sorry to raise an alarm
in the town merely on account of a dream.'

`But you know, Edward, they are a secret, as well
as terrible enemy,' said Mrs Abbot, and raised her
mild eyes to her husband's face with that pleading expression,
when tears seem ready to start, and yet are
checked by the fear of giving pain to the one the heart
loves, that a fond husband finds it so difficult to withstand.

`I will not go to the garrison to day,' said he, laying
down his hat.

`But you promised your father, and he expects you
on important business,' said Mrs Abbot. `You must go.
I know my fears are childish, but they shall not make
me wicked. I am too apt to think my security depends

entirely on your presence. I forget the One mighty to
save can defend me, and that trust in Him is a shield to
the Christian. You had better go.'

`Not without you,' said her husband, who now began
to feel the fears she was endeavouring to shake off.
`Come, prepare our little Edward and we will go down
together. If there has been any alarm we will not return
to night.'

Rebecca paused a few moments, as if considering her
husband's proposition. The subtilties of the ancient
schoolmen are not so perplexing, so difficult of explanation,
so contradictory, as are often the feelings and
wishes of the human heart. Scarce five minutes had
elapsed since Rebecca would have thought permission
to accompany her husband would have obviated every
inconvenience, and been attended with no danger. But
other considerations now arose. Edward had been
summoned to attend a public meeting on affairs of the
town. Should she go with him it might excite notice, for
the ladies of those days seldom visited, and should inquiries
be made she could hardly satisfy them without
alluding to her fears, and then her dream must be told
to justify her fears, and there was no telling where or
when the excitement would stop. And moreover her
husband might incur reproof from the elders for listening
to his wife's fears and dreams, and thus raising agitations
among the people. All these things might occur
because the wife of Edward Abbot could not stay alone
one afternoon.

`I will have more fortitude, Edward,' said Rebecca,
smiling. `I will not make a fool of you, though I appear
like one myself. I will not go. It is nearly a
mile, and you have no time to spare to carry the babe,
or wait for me, and I ought not to go—so do not let me
hinder you another moment.'

It was in vain Edward urged her to accompany him.
The more she saw his generous anxiety on her account,
the more she labored to suppress her fears, till finally
she persuaded him, and herself too, that she felt no uneasiness
at all from the prospect of passing three hours
alone, and Edward departed.

How much interest is given to the ruins of a temple,
castle, or fortification, by having a story of suffering, a
legend of love or tale of heroism connected with the
memory of the crumbling fabrics! Even a rugged mountain
or narrow lake, if associated with the history of human
feelings and passions, becomes more attractive to
the cultivated mind than the resorts of fashion. But of
this romantic kind of interest the wild and beautiful places
of our own land are nearly destitute. Improvement does
not pause in its career to preserve a relic of the olden
times, and industry labors to convert everything into a
source of immediate profit. This course of proceeding is
doubtless most convenient, but it may be questioned
whether it be the most patriotic. The love of country is a
species of pride, compounded of lofty and sacred recollections
of the worth and achievements of our ancestors,
and that vanity which is fostered by knowing the importance
which other nations attach to our history and
traditions. Probably Scott's `Lady of the Lake' imparts
more national pride to a Scotsman than he would
feel in contemplating a rail road from Edinburgh to
London. This pride, created by the productions of genius,
is perfectly compatible with our republican habits
and institutions. Indeed, nothing would more contribute
to deepen, to perpetuate the love of liberty and
our country, than well told legends of our ancestors.
Their piety, ardor, sufferings, constancy, and courage,
and ultimate success would form themes lofty, tender,
or romantic, and yet differing materially in character

from the adventures of European romance. Our fictions,
if well narrated, would now excite more intense
interest than the feats of knights or the fortunes of
princes, because the deeds of American daring were
performed by men either to defend or perpetuate principles,
rights, and possessions, which the enlightened and
liberal of every country feel to be most interesting and
important, and compared with which, the wild deeds of
chivalry and the exploits of the crusaders appear disgusting
or preposterous, criminal or trivial.

This little sketch, however, does not pretend to be
even a sample of what may be wished, and, indeed, expected
from the gifted spirits of our land. It is only the
record of conjugal and maternal love, the same in all
ages and in every nation.

The house of Edward Abbot stood on the western
bank of the Merrimack, nearly a mile from the present
village of Concord, then called Rumford. Edward was
the first who had ventured to reside at such a distance
from the garrisons or fortified houses, and he had thus
obtained the reputation of remarkable courage, of which
he was quite as proud as a dashing blade of these polished
days would be in accepting a challenge to a duel.
His wife, too, participated in his triumph, and the wish
to spare him mortification was a powerful motive to inspire
her with resolution to overcome her own fears and
allow him to depart, when, from the presentiment she
felt that danger was nigh, she would, by the superstition
of the times, have been justified in detaining, or at least,
accompanying him. But she saw him depart without
tears, watched him from the small window till he entered
the forest, and then betook herself to her household
concerns. Yet she could not forbear going frequently
to the door, and sometimes she would go forth and gaze
all around their little domain, and then watch the progress

of the sun, with an expression of countenance that,
to an observer, would instantly have revealed the agitation
and anxiety her heart was suffering. Everything
abroad was in perfect quietness. There was scarce a
breath of air perceptible, and the waters of the Merrimack
flowed without a ripple. The calm July sky
looked a deeper and more heavenly blue, seen as it was
by Rebecca from a spot circumscribed by tall trees,
now clothed with such a fulness of foliage as made the
forest look dark and almost impenetrable. Close around
the house were planted corn and vegetables, and a field
of wheat, in front of the dwelling, stretched in unbroken
green to the river's brink. There was not a sound to
be heard save the chirping of a robin, that had built her
nest on a chestnut which stood close to the southeast
corner of the house, the only tree suffered to grow
within the inclosure of Edward. The young birds were
fully fledged, and, under the guidance of the parents,
were about quitting their nest. Rebecca watched their
movements, the old birds now encouraging, now seeming
to chide their timid offspring, till finally they reached
the woods and all disappeared. Slight as the circumstance
was, it touched Rebecca with a sense of her
loneliness. `Even the birds have left me,' said she to
herself, and pressing her boy closer to her bosom, she
burst into tears. Rebecca might well be excused these
tears and feelings, for though a wife and mother, she
was hardly seventeen. And then Rebecca possessed
an advantage that, in the eyes of young gentlemen,
cancels all feminine weaknesses—she was very beautiful.
A lady now displaying similar charms would, for
her face, be entitled to the epithets of divine, angelic,
Grecian, Madonna, while the gracefulness of her figure
would be well understood by all, travelled or untravelled,
if just compared with the Venus de Medicis.
But the primitive language of our excellent ancestors
conveyed the idea of beauty without all this waste of
words. They simply and briefly called Rebecca `an exceeding
comely young woman.' Yet Rebecca felt no
pride on this account, nor ever dreamed of gaining the
admiration of any one except her husband. There was
then but little of what we call social intercourse, meaning
balls, parties, &c. among the people, but there was
deep, and fervent, and faithful domestic affection. The
former has greatly improved since the period of which
I am writing, but, if we credit the bard, and believe
that
we must not imagine every advantage is reserved for
our own times.

Rebecca watched the sun till it had sunk behind the
western hills, and then she watched its beams on the
clouds till the last faint tints had departed, and, fixing
her eyes steadfastly on that part of the forest from which
she expected to see her husband emerge, she sat at
the door, with her child in her arms, watching in vain
for his appearance. The room into which she occasionally
glanced, looked so gloomy and desolate she
could not endure to enter it. Indeed, as the evening
waxed later, and her fears increased, she sometimes
imagined she saw strange figures, and faces with gleaming
eyes, such as she had beheld in her dream, moving
around the dusky apartment. Ashamed of these fears,
and knowing her husband, when he came, would chide
her for thus exposing herself and her child to the evening
dews, she breathed a prayer to Him who stilled the
tempest, and entered the house. Her first care, after
placing her infant in his cradle, was to light a candle,
and then, more reassured, she took her Bible. The Bible

was the talisman of our ancestors. It guarded them
from evil, and guided them to good. Its pages were a
direction in every difficulty, and its promises a resource
in every trial. Rebecca read, and prayed alternately,
mingling the idea of Edward, his safety, and return with
every thought and wish, but still he came not. She had
no means of ascertaining the lapse of time, except by the
length of candle consumed or the stars, as there was
no moon; but she conjectured it must be past midnight.
Again and again she went forth and examined with
searching glance around, but nothing could she see except
the dark forest, in the distance, and, close around
her dwelling, the black stumps that stood like sentinels
on guard, while nothing was heard save the soft murmur
of the water, and at times, a low rustling as the breeze
stirred the leaves of the chestnut tree. At length, as
she stood at the corner of her house, beneath the shade
of that tree, looking earnestly towards the woods, she
thought she perceived something emerge from their
shadow. If she did, it vanished instantly. She kept
her eyes fixed on the spot. A bright starlight enabled
her to discern objects quite distinctly, even at a distance,
especially when her faculties were roused and
stimulated both by hope and fear. After some time she
again, and plainly, saw a human figure. It rose from the
ground, looked and pointed towards her house, and then
again disappeared. She recollected her light. It could
be seen from the window, and probably had attracted
the notice of the savages, whom, she could no
longer doubt, were approaching. They had, as she
fancied, waylaid and murdered her husband. They were
coming to capture, perhaps murder, her and her child.
What should she do? She never thought of attempting
to escape without her babe; but in what direction
should she fly, when, perhaps, the Indians surrounded
the house? There was one moment of terrible agony,
when the mangled form of her husband seemed before
her, and she heard, in idea, the shrieks of her babe beneath
savage tortures, till her breath failed, and reason
seemed deserting her. But she made a strong effort
to recall her wandering senses, and then, with her
eyes and clasped hands raised to heaven, she took her
resolution. With a noiseless step she entered her
dwelling, extinguished the light, took her infant in her
arms, and again stole softly forth, creeping along in the
shadow of the house till she reached the spot from
whence she had first seen the object that alarmed her.
Here she stood perfectly still. Her infant lay on her
bosom in profound sleep, as quiet and seemingly as
breathless as though his spirit had already departed.
She did not wait long before the same figure again
rose, looked around, and then sank down as before.
The moment it disappeared Rebecca passed swift and
softly as a shadow over the space that separated the
house from the chestnut tree. This tree was an uncommonly
large one, and there was a separation of the
trunk into two branches, about three feet from the
ground, where Rebecca thought it possible she might
be concealed. She gained it, and placed herself in a
position which allowed her to watch the door of her
dwelling. All was silent for a long time—more than an
hour, as she thought, and she began to doubt the reality
of what she had seen, imagining she had been deceived
and taken a stump for a human figure, and she was
about to descend from the tree, where her situation was
extremely uncomfortable, when suddenly a savage crept
by her between the house and tree. As another and another
followed, it was with difficulty she suppressed her
screams. But she did suppress them, and the only
sign she gave of fear was to press her infant closer to
her bosom. They reached the door and a sound of surprise
at finding it open, was uttered by the first savage,
and replied to by the second, in the Indian language.
After a short consultation they entered, and Rebecca
soon saw a light gleam, and supposed they had kindled
it to search for her. Her pulse beat wildly; yet still she
hoped to escape. It was not probable that they would
search a tree so near the house; they would rather suppose
she had fled to a distance. Presently a crackling
noise was heard in the house, the light flashed from
the door and window, the Indians raised their wild
yell as they rushed out, and danced around with frantic
gestures, and Rebecca saw that the house was on fire.

Still, the only sign she gave of fear was, as she unloosed
the handkerchief from her neck and threw it
over her child's face to screen his eyes from the glare
of light that might awaken him, to press him closer and
closer to her heart.

The house was unfinished; there was no plastering
to delay, for a moment, the progress of the fire, which
had been kindled in the centre of the apartment, and
fed by all the combustibles the savages could find in the
dwelling. The flame streamed upwards, and soon caught
the rafters and boards, and it seemed scarce five minutes
from the time Rebecca first saw the light till the blaze
burst through the roof. The atmosphere, rarified by
the heat around the burning building, suddenly expanded,
and the colder and more dense air rushing in, it
seemed as if the wind had violently arisen, and it drove
the thick smoke, and showered the burning cinders directly
on the chestnut tree. Rebecca felt the scorching
heat, while the suffocating vapor almost deprived her
of the power of respiration. She grew dizzy, yet, still,
the only movement she made was to turn her child a
little in her arms that he might be more effectually

shielded from the smoke and cinders. At that moment
one of the savages approached, in the wild movements
of his war dance, close to the tree. An eddy of wind
swept away the smoke; the light fell full on the pale
face of Rebecca; her eyes, as if by the power of fascination,
were rivetted on the Indian; his fiery glance
was raised towards her, and their gaze met. The savage
gave a start, and the note of his war song was
shriller as he intently regarded his victim. Suddenly
he turned away. Rebecca murmured a prayer and resigned
herself to death as she heard them all send forth
a prolonged whoop.

`My boy! my husband! we shall meet, we shall
all meet in heaven!' she cried.

But why did not the savages approach? She listened,
looked around; the whole clearing was illuminated
by the bright glare, and she saw the three Indians flying,
with the speed of frighted deer, to the covert of
the wood. She did not pause to consider what had caused
their flight; but obeying that instinct which bids us
shun the present danger, she sprang from the tree and
rushed towards the river. She recollected a spot where
the bank projected, beneath which, during the summer
months, the bed of the river was nearly dry; there she
should, at least, be secure from the fire.

And there she sheltered herself. Her feet were
immersed in water, and she stood in a stooping posture
to screen herself from observation should the savages
return to seek her. But her infant slumbered
peacefully. None of her fears or dangers disturbed his
repose, and when the morning light allowed her to gaze
on his sweet face, tears of joy and thankfulness flowed
fast down her cheeks, that she had been enabled thus
to shield that dear, innocent one from the savages and
the flames.

Soon after sunrise she heard sounds as of people approaching,
and soon recognised the voices of her friends
from the garrison. Rebecca and her child were conveyed
to the village, which her husband, she found, had
left about sunset on the preceding evening. Nothing
was known, or could be discovered of his fate; the inhabitants
had been alarmed by the light from the burning
building, and as soon as the morning was sufficiently
advanced to allow them to penetrate the forest, they
hastened to discover the cause of the fire.

Grief for the loss of her husband, combined with the
terrors she had suffered, threw Rebecca into a violent
fever, and her life was despaired of; but just as the disorder
seemed approaching a fatal termination, Edward
Abbot arrived at Rumford. He was surprised, while
walking homeward, by four Indians, one of whom seized
his rifle, while another struck him such a blow on the
head with his tomahawk, as totally to deprive him, for
several hours, of all recollection.

When he did recover he found himself lying at the
foot of a tree, his hands bound and an Indian guarding
him. All efforts to escape he found would be in
vain, and he silently submitted to his fate. About day
the three savages joined the one who guarded him, and,
conversing hastily a few moments, they began a hurried
march. Edward perceived one of the Indians examining
him often and attentively. At length, on the
fourth day, as the savage was alone with the prisoner,
he, by signs, questioned Edward concerning the house
where he used to reside. Edward made, on the white
birch with a coal taken from their fire, a drawing of
his little plantation and house, including, of course,
the chestnut tree. The Indian surveyed it in silence,
and Edward thought no more of the matter. Early the
next morning Edward was awakened by the same Indian,

who motioned him to rise, and follow him. The
rest of the party were not in sight. Edward obeyed,
and followed him two days, travelling rapidly, till suddenly
he found himself on the borders of the Merrimack.
The Indian then pointed in the direction of
Concord, and instantly disappeared in the woods.

It is, perhaps, unnecessary to add that Edward's
presence operated much more favorably on Rebecca
than had all the remedies prescribed by the good Doctor
Carter, and she soon recovered. The conduct of the
Indian excited great curiosity, and made much talk in
the village, but, for a long time, the mystery baffled all
conjecture. After many months an Indian who could
speak English, explained the secret.

It seemed that several years before Rebecca was
married, an Indian, with his wife and child, came into
the house of her father, and asked for food. The old
people were absent, and a hired man, acting as many
do when `clothed in a little brief authority,' ordered
them from the house. Rebecca, then a playful, laughing
girl, interposed and prevented them from being thus
inhospitably treated. She brought forth the best food
the house afforded, and took the Indian babe in her
arms and fed it; and to that act of charity, so gracefully
performed, she was indebted for her own, and her
child's life, and her husband's liberty.

THE DEVIL'S LEAP.

There is a pleasant village, not far from the capital
of New England, where the principles and feelings of
our Puritan forefathers were planted too early, and rooted
too deeply, to change with every shifting mode of
popular fashion. It was among the first hamlets settled
in the whole country. Attracted by the rich bottoms
of land indented by the sea, and intersected by
streams meandering through hill and dale, the quick-sighted
pilgrims of the Massachusetts, began a settlement
there in the very oldest Colony times.

The number of its inhabitants rapidly increased, and
speedily came to constitute one of our leading churches,
the pillars of our spiritual Israel. Actuated by the ardent
sense of religious devotion, which pervaded the
conduct of our ancestors, and which, if it sometimes
led to unseemly excesses of zeal, was yet in the main a
noble and most efficient spring of high minded action,
they did not fail to strain their utmost means in the
construction of suitable places for the worship of the
Almighty, according to the unadulterated simplicity of
primitive christian faith.

It has not always happened in our country towns that
the selection of a site for a church, or a meetinghouse
as the Puritans rather affectedly phrased it, has done
much credit to the taste of its founders. Fortunately,

in the village to which my story relates, a situation
was chosen for their church, that was eminently picturesque
and commanding.

It stood upon the brow of an undulating hill, a few
miles from the sea coast, and near to a small river, which
flowed in a winding course to the ocean. Placing
himself upon this elevated ground, in front of the principal
entrance of the church, the spectator might look
to the right hand over a large plain, covered, then, with
forest trees, and terminating in a wide amphitheatre of
distant hills. Before him he could see the river now
floating gently onward upon a smooth bed, now brawling
across the rugged projections of rock, which broke
the stream into waterfalls, or caused it to foam and
dash along in rushing rapids and turbulent eddies.
Further off, on the left, an extensive range of verdant
pastures and well watered meadows might be discerned,
sprinkled over with here and there a humble farm house
and fields of yellow waving corn, until the remote ocean
bounded the grateful prospect, which seemed to melt
into the horizon.

Although surrounded by rich and well cultivated
lands, the spot itself on which the church stood, as frequently
occurs in every part of New England, presented
a surface of solid rock, not jagged, nor split into
cliffs, nor scattered about in huge fragments, but extending
in a compact mass just along the level of the
ground, seeming as if the ribs of the earth were peeping
out from under a too scanty covering of soil. In the
neighbourhood of this romantic scene, tradition preserves
the account of a singular incident, of which,
marvellous as it is, and strange as it may therefore appear
to us doubting moderns, there still continues a
lasting monument upon the spot.

The legend has it, that, at a certain period in the olden
times of the Colony, no matter in what precise year,
a clergyman of the good old New England stock was
pastor of the little community who worshipped in the
church above described. He was devout, pious, zealous,
and throughly imbued with the spirit of religious
endurance and courage, which sustained the men of
that age through extremities of suffering, before which
feebler spirits would have blenched and sunk. So exalted
was his reputation for piety, that, if his people
might be credited, the devil himself had been worsted
in more than one fierce and desperate encounter with
the reverend pastor.

Whether the evil spirit was returning from the
nightly orgies of some dark crew of witches not far off,
or what other object he had been pursuing, I know
not; but it so befell that upon a certain occasion this
church lay in his path. As he approached, designing
to pass near it, or through it, perhaps, by some satanic
art, the voice of his dreaded foe, who was dispensing
the words of grace from the pulpit, struck upon his ear,
just as he ascended the little eminence upon which it
stood. Enraged at the sound, he leaped over the
church at one furious bound, uttering a yell of spite,
which filled the assembled congregation with astonishment
and horror.

Reader, be not incredulous of the fact; for if you
should ever chance to journey through the town of
I—, you will have ocular demonstration of its truth.
The church still lifts its venerable steeple over the selfsame
hill. The river flows tranquilly by, as before, except
that persevering industry has fixed flourishing
manufactories upon its little waterfalls. The same
agreeable rural scenery is visible all around, with the
addition of many an improvement placed there by wealth

and refinement. And upon the broad, flat surface of
the rock in front of the church, where the Enemy of
Man halted to take his tremendous leap, the print of his
footstep remains plainly discernible, stamped upon the
hard exterior by no human power, affording indubitable
evidence of the veracity of the tradition.

THE TABLE OF EMERALD.