part I assumed, of carelessness, for I took up the package with a light

laugh, thanked my uncle, and dropped a very lowly reverence to her as I approached the door, saying, “I hope, my dear madam, that your truly _Christian_ heart is now at rest, having seen the end of our game, begun to relieve the tedium or worse of a country-house, blessed with such an inmate as your venerable self.”

I have a dim recollection of seeing her eyes open wide and still wider with perfect amaze, and the words “heartless flirt,” fell from her lips. I reached my room, though my pride was fast ebbing, and locked myself in. I opened the bundle—my own letters came tumbling therefrom, and _one_ from _him_. I put it here, that with the record of my willful error, its punishment may also be seen.

“Miss Walton,—I return you your letters, and your vows of love—when the substance is not possessed, how worthless is the shadow. I scorn myself for having loved one who could so wantonly trifle with a trustful, loving heart, which has been taken when proffered, to throw away as a worthless object. May you be happy, but that I am afraid you will not be. I hope that you will be more careful of the next heart that you may witch to love you. At least, never say of him in the presence of either friends or enemies, “he will do well enough to amuse one’s self with in the country!” I again say, may you be happy, and as my happiness can only be in forgetting you, I shall never seek to hear of you; and rest easy that this will be the last letter with which you will ever be troubled from the hand of

Hugh Dudley.”

It was over! and I sat long silent and motionless with the letters before me. I then determined to bear uncomplainingly my fate, and never let _him_ know the agony which his thus breaking _our_ engagement had caused me. “Did I die from it,” was my proud resolution, “I will die in silence. He, to believe so quickly, so readily, an assertion made against me, by an enemy of his, and proved by an enemy of mine. Did he ask me, ‘Was it so—and wherefore?’ No: but acted on the information, careless of my pain—oh! well he knew that I loved him—and exulted in it from revenge. Had he asked me, oh! how humbly would I have acknowledged my fault, and throwing myself more trustingly on his love, how would I have prayed for forgiveness, till the proud man, in his strength, would have been softened by my tears, and taken me again in love to his bosom.” But it was over, and she who had caused this misery should not triumph. I jumped from my seat, bathed my eyes, curled my hair elaborately, decked myself in a most becoming dress, and on seeing my ashy cheeks, in the glance I gave into the glass, for the first time painted them with carmine. I then descended into the drawing-room. Mr. Harold, the wealthy merchant from the city, whom I have spoken of, had returned the day before, on a visit to my uncle, and for him, and to him, I played and sung. I was in my wildest spirits. I kept up this farce for weeks whenever the eyes of the household were upon me, till I thought in the struggle my mind must give way. At this crisis a letter came from a cousin of my mother, to whom I had written to ask for an asylum, gladly welcoming me to her home—for she was aged and infirm, and wanted companionship. I accepted at once; received a cold acquiescence from my uncle—a still more indifferent one from my cousin—and set out for my new home in Kentucky, determined to hide myself forever from the eyes of those whose triumph was built on the ruins of my happiness. Oh! Hugh, could you have known how deeply I have repented of that speech, wrung from my wounded pride, even you would have forgiven me and loved me still—but you never, never loved as I did you. But it is, as I said, all, all past; my dream is ended, and I now walk sadly my allotted time on earth, a sorrower and a sojourner in a vale of tears.

* * * * *

Here ended this sketch from her journal; and Cora Norton sat at first meditating, with her head still leaning on her arm. Turning at last to her aunt, who was dozing across the room, she said—

“What has become of Col. Dudley, Aunt Mary?”

“Ech! what!” exclaimed the old lady; and then being thoroughly roused, she took her knitting from the floor, where it had slipped during her nap, received from Cora her spectacles, and upon her niece repeating her inquiry—

“He is now,” said Aunt Mary, gaping and rubbing her eyes, “the husband of Clare Alton, and lives in his far distant home—at least so I heard about five years since, the only time I ever heard of him. It is said that the match was made up for him entirely by his aunt, and that Clare is an excellent housekeeper—raises more chickens and turkies than any lady in the neighborhood. She, as my informant told me, is quite the _model_ housewife of her neighbors, and has finished a hexagon bed-quilt, of I don’t know how many thousand patches. As to herself and the colonel, they get along very politely I believe—

“Living together as most people do, Suffering each other’s foibles, by accord, And not exactly either one or two.”

And now, Cora love, it is bedtime. Need I ‘point a moral’ to the journal you have read? Ah! no, you say. Well! when that little rattling tongue of yours seems disposed to laugh and say flippant things about your lovers, think of my girl-friend, Florence Walton, and profit by her dear-bought experience.”

* * * * *

THE PRISONER’S DEATH-BELL.

BY REV. H. HASTINGS WELD.

Blessed be His name whose messages of peace Not to the worldly or the proud are borne: Whose light bids in the dungeon darkness cease, Whose mercy clothes him whom the world has shorn.

Vain are the efforts of vindictive power, Vain are its chains to bind a spirit down; For that to Heaven in prayer can calmly soar When earthly foes in utmost fury frown.

Death to the youthful is untimely wo— Death to the happy is a fearful grief— But weary age is not averse to go:— The captive welcomes even death’s relief.

What then to him the frowning prison-walls— The clanking chain, the tyrant’s vengeful spite? From the freed spirit every shackle falls— Earth’s gloom is lost in Heaven’s glorious light.

* * * * *

A STORY FOR CHRISTMAS.

FROM THE GERMAN.

“‘Does thy right hand offend thee, cut it off and cast it from thee.’ That is in the Bible, to be sure, but it is no remedy for this terrible pain,” sighed the suffering Pastor Seidelman, “for if it goes from my hands I have it in my feet, and if I were to cut off all my limbs what would become of his reverence?”

“Ah, Conrad,” said his faithful nurse and wife, and smiled through her tears, “you are always so cheerful in the midst of your sufferings.”

“And why not, Catharine? Am I master of this pain, or its slave? And can I not always imagine that these limbs belong to some one else, and that I have nothing to do with them? But the hardest to bear is, that the miserable things keep me here in this arm-chair, whilst every thing without there is so blooming and beautiful; the wall-flowers and harebells are just as fine, or finer in my garden than in Herman & Hübner’s—that I cannot on this glorious evening feast upon strawberries with you all in the arbor, and that you, dear Catharine—this is the worst—must be confined here to nurse me. Has the spring-time of our life all vanished?”

“Ah, Conrad,” said his wife cheeringly, and stroked his pale cheeks, “we have so many blessings left—our love and our children. Let us thank God for all—for our joys, and for our sorrows too. Ah, if you could only go to the springs at A——.”

“Yes, yes,” said the pastor, “but never mind. The springs are distant and dear. I have given it up long ago. Sometimes, indeed, it seems as if it would be a little thing for my lord count up on the hill to treat his old pastor to the journey. But he must need all his money for the gay life he leads at the capital—oh, no! he is not to be thought of, nor the springs either.”

This had been the conclusion for the last ten years of every conversation between the worthy people, whenever the subject was the health of the good pastor. What availed him his duties so faithfully performed, the love and veneration of his flock, his gay world of flowers just outside the door, and his circle of blooming children? There he sat in the great arm-chair, while without the birds were singing, the lindens in full leaf, the little six-years-old Paul was exercising a troop of wooden soldiers, the gentle Hermine dancing merrily, and in a distant part of the garden the beautiful Theodora was walking with her youngest brother, the little pet, Ernst. Indeed, the worthy Seidelman might well be happy, surrounded by all these treasures. But he was bowed down by disease, not of mind, but of body; and he was very poor, though that was no one’s fault but his own. For how in the world was any one with such a soft heart ever to grow rich. His house was always open to the needy, and not rarely to the wolf even in sheep’s clothing, and often when on his return from some wedding, his wife would search anxiously in his pockets for the fee, he would say, with a look of shame and contrition, “Don’t be vexed, Catharine, I have given it to Gottlieb, he has broken his leg;” then both would smile through their tears, and the orders to the butcher for the next week would be countermanded.

But one other grief burdened the worthy people. Anxiety on account of their favorite child Theodora, just eighteen years old, and so gentle, who became every day more and more estranged from them. In his sleepless nights of pain, she left the care of her father entirely to her mother and her sister Hermine, and shut herself up in her room, where they saw her candle burning until long after midnight, and to their anxious questionings she gave only confused, unsatisfactory replies. But now, when the roses in her cheeks had begun to fade, her father and mother had determined that, when twilight came, when she always went to walk in the large garden, they would penetrate into her securely-locked apartment, and solve, if possible, the sad riddle. And they had selected this evening for the attempt.

There she strolled through the dark linden walks on this lovely summer evening, with her little brother. But there was even more joy in her heart than in the glad singing of Ernst, and the setting sun mirrored itself in her eyes, sparkling with delight. “Sink into thy golden cradle, thou friendly light; with thy setting arises a holyday for us all, thy Easter morning, oh, dear father.” Thus she exulted, all unconscious of the treachery meditated against her by the anxious love of her parents. And just at this moment, when, full of happiness, she bent down over a hedge of roses, suddenly the fate of her future life stood before her, a youth of most prepossessing appearance. He started at the sight of the fair girl, and greeted her with evident embarrassment. Theodora, too, was confused, she knew not why, and her handkerchief dropped from her trembling hand while she turned hastily away. He picked it up, hastened after her, and in a gentle voice, but with a foreign accent, begged pardon if his sudden appearance had alarmed her, and hoped that on so beautiful an evening he might not be the cause of shortening her walk. But her walk was interrupted, and she turned toward home much sooner than she had intended, just in time to frustrate, for this evening at least, the design of her parents, who were just upon the point of ascending the stairs to her room.

And now, when supper was finished, and the pastor was lighting his evening pipe, with the children playing around him, what heavy parcel does Theodora bring in, and what drops are those shining upon her cheek? “My dear father,” she said, “I bring you here the money—a hundred dollars—which I have earned for you. It is little, but it is enough to carry you to the springs. Now you will be well once more,” and she sunk into his arms.

Imagine the happiness of this moment. The children left their play and gathered round their parents; the father weighed the gold incredulously in his hand, and the whole secret was disclosed amid thanks and kisses. Upon the altar of filial love Theodora had laid the hard earnings of her needle. For two long years she had sewed and embroidered with unremitting industry, while every one else was sleeping. Her cheeks indeed were pale, and she had been for a while estranged from those who were dearer to her than all the world beside, but she had gained the reward that she had striven for so long.

“Present arms!” cried Paul to his soldiers; “don’t you see, you rogues, in whose presence you are standing?”

“Yes, dear one,” said her father, “you have worked hard indeed for me, for us all, and thy days shall be long in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.”

More brightly than the star-spangled heaven without, shone the heaven glittering with new hopes and joys within the little parsonage. “You will be well again,” cried the children, “you will be able to dance just like us.”

“Yes,” answered their father, “to dance, and ride, and—but only think, Catharine, of my really going to the springs! I can hardly believe it.”

They all talked over the journey with the comforting conviction that it was no longer a mere vision, and it was unalterably determined that Theodora should accompany her father. The council sat until far into the night, that every thing might be discussed—what they should carry with them, and through what towns and villages they should pass on their journey. But when the village watchman called “Twelve o’clock,” the father knocked the ashes out of his pipe, and said, “Children, it is late, we shall have a whole day to-morrow.” Paul shut up his soldiers in their barracks made by some old folios on the lowest shelf of the book-case, and certainly the god of slumber never embraced happier people than the inhabitants of that little cottage.

Theodora alone could not sleep. Her mind was too much excited to be quickly composed to rest. As the moon shining on drops of dew causes them to emit sparkles in the dark night, which vanish again suddenly, so dreams and fancies sprung up in Theodora’s mind, and she hardly suspected that the stranger in the park was the chief cause of her excitement. Without any distinct thoughts of him, and without the remembrance of a word that he had said, his image was, in the confusion of her mind, like the foundation color in a landscape, like the _thema_ in one of Beethoven’s symphonies. Only in her short morning slumber did his image present itself, as he handed her the handkerchief. But the dream vanished before the clear light of the morning sun, and the day with its busy plans and thousand occupations dissipated the half-formed visions of the night. Again, however, twilight came with its shadows, its cool breezes, and its memories, and as she again strolled down the garden with her little brother, her heart fluttered with feelings of alarm and anxiety. She feared that the young stranger would suddenly stand before her again, as he had done upon the preceding evening, and yet she could not keep away from the dangerous spot. But no stranger appeared; she glanced timidly down the dark walk, but nothing was to be seen.

At last, lost in thought, she stood before the very rose-bush where she had first seen him the day before. But her reverie was suddenly interrupted, for Ernst sprung from behind a large lilac-bush, dragging the stranger with him, and crying, “I have you, you rogue; you want to play hide and seek with Dora, do you? Away with you!” With a frank smile the young man, yielding to the child, approached the blushing girl, who would fain have turned away. “Hold him fast,” cried Ernst, “or he will run away, and before I can get my horsemen out to follow him he will be beyond the mountains.”

“That will he not, my little fellow,” said the stranger, and then turning to Theodora, he frankly confessed that only the hope of seeing her again had prevented his continuing his journey with his father. He told her—but who can tell with pen and ink what a youth, only twenty years old, who has at first sight fallen head over ears in love, says to a beautiful girl, at such a romantic hour and on such a lovely spot?

Theodora herself hardly knew what he had said, but only (when two hours afterward she slowly walked toward her dear home) that he had poured out the most ardent protestations of love, and that, although obliged to leave on the morrow for, she knew not what part of the country, he had promised to return. Whence had come that sparkling ring upon her finger, and whither had gone the rose that she had worn all day long in her bosom? His name she knew was Robert, but all else that he had said about himself and his family had vanished from her mind. He was going away on the morrow with his father, whither, she had not the remotest idea, and to inquire about him was out of the question. The vision had vanished, but the diamond on her finger sparkled consolingly, and she drew it off, to keep it carefully until it should be redeemed by the donor.

The next day was consumed in preparations for the journey, and on the following morning, after all had been refreshed by the hot coffee, and the father had prayed, “May God bless our goings out and our comings in,” he was warmly packed in the neat traveling-carriage, with Theodora at his side; leave was taken of the dear ones who must stay behind, and they drove off. As the tall tops of the trees seemed to nod a kindly farewell in the fresh morning air, Theodora thought longingly of the last few days, and shrunk from the unknown future. She determined to lock up her hopes and fears in her own breast—for how could she speak of them to her father. An accidental meeting with a young stranger was, as she would fain persuade herself, such a commonplace occurrence; and her father, too, was so occupied with the journey, with thoughts of the old friends whom he should see, and, above all, with the flowers which, whenever they passed a garden, threw him into ecstasies, that a fit opportunity never presented itself.

As they approached A——, through a beautiful landscape, they met glittering equipages and horsemen, and gayly-dressed parties of pedestrians. Music sounded from the lighted saloons, and a new world opened itself around the young girl. But anxious emotions filled her heart, and she longed for the quiet home-circle of mother, brothers and sisters.

Still she breathed more freely as she entered her quiet little room in their lodging-house, where every thing was so neat and convenient; even the piano had not been forgotten, and the window opened upon the pretty little garden belonging to the house, where were green lindens, fragrant lilies, and an arbor of woodbine, like the one in dear R——. “Oh heavens!” cried her enraptured father, “there is the double lychnis chalcedonia, blooming in greater perfection than my single one; and there (it can be no dream) there, Theodora, is the white Georgina, which I have never seen before, growing among those pinks and carnations.”

Every thing was delightful. Their domestic arrangements were soon made, and, on the following morning, the spring which was to give health to the invalid was tried, while Theodora sat at home in the garden and worked.

Many parties of fashionable promenaders passed by, and troops of horsemen galloped past; but Theodora heeded them not; and when her father returned, she was ready to receive him; they partook of their frugal meal, and then came singing and the piano. But early one morning, as she sat at work—heavens! who was that who flew by upon his foaming English steed? She dropped her work in her agitation, but the stranger, no less surprised, reined in his horse, sprang off, rushed up the little garden, and greeted her with the warmest expressions of his surprise and pleasure.

Scarcely capable of replying, Theodora returned his greeting, but instantly her confusion overcame her, and she asked, with a deep blush, how he, whom she had thought so distant, came to be just here.

“O, this place,” was his reply, “is the destination of my poor father’s journey.”

“Then you are here for the same purpose that we are?” asked she. “What is your father’s disease?”

“Ah! let me be silent upon that point,” sighed Robert; “I am very unhappy. But I trust in God that these clouds will clear off; and now that I see you, all seems brighter and more hopeful. And,” continued he, gazing searchingly into her clear, calm eyes, “I am very vain; but your looks tells me, Theodora, that you still remember those happy meetings in R——. You shall learn to know me; you shall not find me unworthy of your love; and then I will place the decision of our fate in your father’s hands, and _my_ father, too—why can I not lead you to him now, and say, ‘See, father, the happiness of your only son.’”

“And why do you fear him?” said Theodora, “does he know me?”

“I must not say,” sighed Robert; “the hand of fate is heavy upon me now; but here and there I can discern through the clouds the clear blue of heaven. O, trust in me, Theodora, if I am an outcast _now_, trust my heart, full of love, if there is in yours one spark of interest in me.”

The thorns in this declaration pressed deep into the heart of the poor girl. Confidence, love, and doubt raised a wild warfare in her breast; she saw the heaven of her pure first love so overclouded, and she saw Robert depart with a heavier heart than she had ever known before. The next day, and the next, while her father was bathing, Robert was with her; and although her confidence in him grew continually, the riddle grew more dark and mysterious.

“Say not a word even to your father of our love,” said Robert; “I plead only for a little time, and I myself will open my heart to him.”

As long as he was with her, she felt consoled, but with his departure, her peace fled.

The happy father, in the meantime, did not perceive his daughter’s increasing melancholy. Two weeks had done wonders for him; every day he grew stronger. The reviving air breathed new life into the worthy man. “O, my child,” said he, joyfully, throwing open the gate one day, at the commencement of the third week, “what do you think I have seen? You will scarcely believe it; but it is really so—a _Banksia serrata_, in full bloom, stands in the castle garden. O, Dora! the exquisite contrast, such heavenly blue and gorgeous yellow! I—but you must see it; and, only think, the gardener has promised me a shoot! God _has_ blessed our goings out and our comings in; only see how well I can move my arm; in another week I shall be as well—better than ever. But there is so much misery here—if I were only rich; and there is one man so wretched, who, dressed in a miserable old gray coat, walks about all day amongst the gay and happy—if I only had a little money for him, he should find his health, too, in these glorious baths.”

Thus spoke the old man out of his grateful, child-like soul, and never noticed how little part Dora took in his joy and kind wishes, or how pale she had grown. But the next morning, deeds followed the good pastor’s words. On his return from the bath, he hastened to the garden, and there stood the flower that he so dearly loved, with its magnificent leaves and petals upon which the sun shone, making the dew-drops glitter with a thousand rainbow tints, and on every side bloomed the rarest plants. “Great, indeed, are the works of the Lord,” said the enthusiast, taking off his cap reverently. Just at this moment the old man in the gray coat, his head bent down, and his hands behind him, as usual, passed by. “Ah! _Banksia serrata_,” murmured the pastor to himself, “no misery should exist where you bloom in such beauty;” and half unconsciously he put his hand into his pocket, drew out his purse, slipped it in the old man’s hand, and then vanished in the crowd. “Now you will have a happy day,” cried he, in his innocent joy; “perhaps it may cure you—who knows.” But now, like the book of the Evangelist, which was first honey and then bitterness, a serious consideration rushed on the mind of the pastor. He had sacrificed upon the altar of humanity far more than half the pittance which was supporting him at the baths, and had barely enough remaining to pay for the journey back to R——. “Theodora,” he said, as he entered their little room, “you must pack up every thing; I have done a foolish thing—my heart ran away with my head; I have given away the twenty dollars that were in the purse, and the purse besides. We must go home in two days at the furthest, if we do not wish to beg our way back.”

“Oh yes,” cried Theodora, bursting into tears, “let us go to-day—as soon as possible!”

“What is the matter, my child?” asked her father, terrified and amazed at her tears.

Ah! unconscious father, while you stood before your beloved flower, and returned thanks to Heaven for its beauty, the heart of your poor child was broken, and the rose of her pure love crushed.

Theodora had been working all the morning in the garden, as usual; but not as usual did Robert appear at the appointed time. In her anxiety at his non-appearance she was not even allowed the blessing of retirement and silence—for the talkative landlady brought a friend to the garden, whom she wished to introduce to the pretty stranger from R——. Now if Robert came, he would have to retreat—for the departure of these gossips was not to be thought of. But he came not; and she was listening in despair to the last stroke of ten o’clock, when a dashing barouche whirled by, containing upon the back seat two gaudily-dressed ladies, between whom sat—Robert.

He boldly threw a kiss to poor Dora, and the ladies, lifting their eye-glasses, honored her with a long stare, followed by a burst of laughter. Theodora grew pale.

“Do you know that man?” asked the landlady; “he is the most dissipated fellow here, and a gambler by profession.”

“And his companions,” added the friend, “are low people from the capital.”

Poor Theodora! with difficulty she kept from falling, but the paleness which overspread her face alarmed the good landlady, who hurried her into the house and administered all kinds of restoratives. When she was alone tears came to her relief—“Ah!” sobbed she, “how could such fair, earnest words come from a heart so vile. But I will pluck this love from my heart, and then farewell peace and hope in this life.”

“Yes, let us go from this dreadful place,” said she to her father when she had told him all; “you are quite well again. And this ring—he gave it to me as a pledge of his truth; take the glowing jewel from me, father dear, it burns into my soul.”

“My poor child,” said her father, “you will indeed be happier in our quiet home; as for this ring, it could only have been given to you by one to whom thousands are as nothing; only by some wretched gambler. And all this mystery that he has preserved. Oh, yes! I see it all. Thank God, my child, that he has delivered you from a gambler, that he has separated your lot from his, for whom there is no love, no home, who can live only in the heated air of the saloon, amidst the despairing cries of the losers and the greedy exclamations of the few whom chance favors! Pack up every thing; the day after to-morrow we will set out for dear, quiet R——, where Heaven will rain down peace upon thy heart, as it has already poured its blessing of health upon me.”

Thus with affectionate words did the father drown, at least, the voice of sorrow in his poor child’s heart, and for the first time, at the approach of evening, she accompanied him into his sanctum, the garden. But the brilliant colors of the flowers pained her with the contrast between them and her own heart. Red is the color of happy love, and ah! Theodora, these are not for thee—there under the weeping-willow blooms thy flower, its leaves are the color of the blue above, and although the faithless waves at its foot are always flowing on, its image is always mirrored in them; so, Theodora, will thy love remain while the river of thy life flows on, and faith will ever repeal in thy heart—“Forget me not.”

“_Banksia serrata_,” cried her father joyfully, and led her to the beautiful plant. She gazed enchanted. Here was no gaudy mixture of colors, no dazzling brilliancy. Gentleness seemed to breathe in the fragrance wafted from the flower, that heavenly blue—it was her own forget-me-not exalted to honor. Her eyes filled with tears, the sight had comforted her, and she loitered quietly back through the long promenade with her father; outshining in her simple beauty the crowd of fashionables collected there at that hour.

“There he is,” said her father, trying to elude the recipient of his morning’s bounty.

But the old man had seen him, and stepping up to him, growled out—“Sir, a word with you.”

“Go, wait for me there, upon that bench, Dora,” said her father. And she went timidly.

“What,” said the stranger, “is that your daughter? I suppose she is good-for-nothing, but she is a pretty creature, certainly.

“As concerns yourself,” he continued, in broken German, “it would, I suppose, be impolite if I should say, ‘My friend, are you a knave or a fool?’ so I will restrain my curiosity, and only ask how you know me?”

“Sir,” replied the pastor, “I do not know you.”

“Oh, don’t deny it,” said the other; “was it not you who slipped the purse into my hands this morning? You think to plant your grain in fruitful ground. Few here look as ragged as I, but how came you to know of the gold under the rags? But this stupid speculation of yours will never succeed.”

“Sir,” interrupted the pastor, with dignity, “what do you think of your fellow men?”

“The worst,” said the old man; “they are all as good-for-nothing as I am. But you have thrown your money away, which you seem to need yourself.”

“No, I have not thrown it away,” replied the pastor; “you are sick, my friend.”

“I am not your friend; I have no friend.”

“O, wretched indeed are you if you have no friend; then indeed you have nothing. Yes, you are really ill in body and mind. What I could do to cure the disease of the first I have done, and it is not worth speaking of, but to relieve the last I can bring to my aid, though I am very poor, the consolation of sympathy and—religion. I am the Pastor Seidelman, from R——.”

“What! the Pastor Seidelman!” cried the old man; “and that beautiful girl is your daughter?”

“She is,” replied the pastor; “you know nothing of us, but let me know enough of you to afford you all the consolation in my power.”

So saying, he drew the old man to a seat under the lindens, and sat down. His heart, overflowing with gratitude for the blessing of his renewed health, poured itself out toward the stranger in words so full of sympathy that they seemed half to provoke a spark of kindliness in the stranger’s breast.

“By heaven!” he cried, “you are the most endurable man I have yet met with in my wretched life, and ten times better than I. Is it so? Can I find such a thing as a friend?”

“It is certain,” said Seidelman; “I am your friend.”

“But I am a wretched beggar, crazed by the ingratitude with which my native country, England, has sent me helpless out into the world. I can never reward your kindness—I can give you nothing but my misery. Will you still be my friend?”

“Come with us to R——,” cried the pastor, “we are poor, too, but you shall not want loving care, and Theodora shall nurse you.”

“Ah, call the girl here,” said the stranger; and Theodora modestly approached.

The countenance of the old man grew more and more cheerful as he talked with the honest pastor and his lovely daughter. But suddenly he started up, grasped the pastor’s shoulder with trembling hands, and stammered—“I am ill—I must go home.” Then, refusing their offers of assistance, he promised to meet them on the same spot the next day, and was quickly lost in the crowd.

The pastor and his daughter returned to their lodgings, thinking and speaking of nothing but the strange old man.

“We sent him away,” cried the landlady, as she met them at the garden-gate, “he has been here twice; quite pale with terror, but it is good for him.”

“Who?” asked the father.

“Why the gambler, to be sure.” And poor Theodora shrunk into a dark corner of the room.

Her father inquired his name and direction of the landlady, and immediately inclosed the costly ring to him in a note which ran thus:

“Sir—Commissioned by my daughter, Theodora, and with her full countenance, I return to you this ring, of which we have as little need as the honor of your society.”

The next day they hoped again to meet the old man, but he was no where to be found, and even their gossiping landlady knew nothing of him—so they were obliged to give up all hope of seeing him again.

Early on the following morning they set out for their dear home, and as the carriage drove through the avenue of trees before the house, and Theodora in vain endeavored to conceal her fast falling tears, which came so fast at the remembrance of the happiness now fled forever, some one behind them panted out—

“Hold—for Heaven’s sake, stop!”

“Robert!” cried Theodora, and sunk back, almost fainting.

“Drive on,” said her father; and the driver cracked his whip, and the light carriage flew swiftly from its pursuer, whose exclamations were soon lost in the distance.

But just as they reached the extreme end of the village, a dashing vehicle from the opposite direction rattled by. Heavens! there on the back seat, between the two bold, gaudy ladies, sat—the gambler. As the lightning illumines the dark night, did the truth flash upon Theodora’s mind. The faithful lover who had pursued her carriage, and from whom she had so unrelentingly fled, could not be identical with the man whom they had just seen apparently returning from some nightly revel. The resemblance was indeed wonderful, but it was only a resemblance.

“Oh, Robert, Robert!” sobbed the unhappy girl, “how wretched I am.”

“Trust in God, dear child,” said her father; “all is for the best. His ways are not as our ways.”

“Ah! all hope has gone, and I—I alone am guilty!”

Three weeks ago how much happiness the little carriage had contained, but now how dark every thing seemed. Still as they approached the dear home, their sorrow grew milder, and when on the fifth day they were greeted by the _patois_ of their native province, thoughts of their return were uppermost in Theodora’s mind. Her father brought back what he had scarcely dared to hope for in this life, health, and she had some little token for each member of the dear circle. A warm shawl for her mother, the embroidered kerchief for Hermine, a book for Ernst, and a sabre for the young soldier.

And now the white tower of the castle of R—— gleamed in the twilight, and on every side dear familiar objects greeted them. There the pine wood, and now over the forget-me-not brook under the hanging-boughs of the willows around the mill, and they were in the village. And what a joyful welcome awaited them here. “It is our dear pastor,” resounded from all sides, caps were waved, and hands thrust into the carriage windows. The pastor bowed right and left with emotion, but as the carriage drove by the church he uncovered his venerable head, and a grateful prayer gushed from his overflowing heart.

As they turned the corner, and the peaceful parsonage embowered in its magnificent trees stood before them, mother and children came hastening to meet them with cries of joy. “Children,” cried the pastor, “it has all gone!—you need no longer creep round so quietly, and try not to touch me. Come here! and pinch me, I am really well again, and we must thank the dear Lord and Theodora for it.”

“Oh dear sister! O father! mother! brother!” sounded on all sides, and there was no end to the joyful welcome. And the noise and glee all began anew when the trunks were unpacked, and the presents produced. And the questions and answers! Paul wished particularly to know how many lions and tigers his father had seen on the journey. Hermine, how the ladies in A—— were dressed, and the mother what they had for dinner. All were satisfied, and went happy to bed.

But the morning came, the day passed, and in the evening there wandered in the park unhappy love. But Theodora suffered no longer in secret, her mother’s heart and her father’s kind words offered healing to her wounded soul, although she felt that for her there was no happiness left. On the sixth day the post brought a letter for Theodora. She handed it tremblingly to her father, and sank upon a seat, while her father read aloud to her, as follows—

“Theodora, my Theodora, I am the happiest of mortals! Wherever I turn I see nothing but happiness and joy. The sky is clear and blue above me, and you love me and will always love me. You have repelled me, but indeed you knew me not. You have left my ring in the hands of vice, but how could you know it? Did I not myself doubt my own identity when I first saw him? Is not that vile fellow, Rodel, my perfect double? But all is right again, and I have your ring upon my finger. Hear how it all came about. The day after you left, I went to the promenade overwhelmed with agony at your departure, and your manner toward me. There I saw the detestable gambler, Rodel, and a ray of light from his finger caught my eye. I looked at it more attentively—it was the very ring that I had given you. I felt that I must instantly know how he came by it, and perhaps it would unravel the mystery.

“‘Sir,’ said I, turning to him, ‘you have a fine stone there.’

“‘Do you like it?’ said the fellow with assumed nonchalance, ‘_ma foi_, it does not look amiss, and from a fair one too.’

“‘I controlled myself, followed him to his room, and stepping up to him, said coldly and seriously—

“‘Mr. Rodel, be pleased to tell me upon this spot how you came by that ring.’

“‘_En vérité mon enfant_,’ laughed he, ‘you are very amusing, but I am not in a joking humor, what do you want of me?’

“‘The ring,’ replied I, ‘and an open confession of how you came by it.’

“‘I can easily tell you that, the more readily as I think you already guess the truth. I received it from my lady fair, Miss Theodora S——. Ah! my dear fellow, she is _un morceau de prince_.’

“Your name, dear love, sounded to my heart like a thunderclap, but only because such lips dared to pronounce it, for I never for an instant supposed that he owed the ring to any thing but some miserable fraud. Without allowing myself to be outwardly disturbed by the man’s impudence, ‘no more of this,’ I said, ‘give me the ring this moment, or I will immediately inform Gen. B—— of the ingenious trick by which he lost his two thousand louis d’ors yesterday. You may have seen me before? I have also seen you, and although yesterday it was none of my business, and I did not feel myself called upon to act as guardian to your dupes, to-day the office suits me exactly. So choose—the ring, and an explanation, or the general’s whip, and my pistols.’ Pale and trembling, the wretch drew the ring from his finger and handed it to me with your father’s note. I hastened away with my heart filled with happiness. All was clear to me—only your grief in being so deceived troubled me. No, my Theodora, I am not unworthy of you. Tell every thing to your father, and commend me to his love. I would write to him but I cannot. Yes, Theodora, there is mystery still, the time for explanation is not yet arrived, but I can see nothing but joy in store for us. Trust in my fervent eternal love as I trusted in yours. It is impossible for you to answer this, for you do not know where I am; I, myself do not know where I may be to-morrow. But soon I shall be with you, never to leave you but to be always your own,

Robert.”

Theodora’s eyes now sparkled with love and joy, but her father silently folded the letter again and gave it to her.

“How, father?” she asked, “you say nothing!”

“What can I say?” replied her father. “He has acted nobly, and that he really loves you is clear to me. But, beware my child, the tempter goeth about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.”

But a new life had begun for Theodora. She soon knew the dear letter by heart, and thought only of _his_ return. Thus a week passed away, and another, when the post again brought a letter for her father, marked _private_.

“From my dear friend, Dr. S——, of the springs at A——, said he, as he locked himself into his study, and seating himself in his arm-chair, read the following—

“Dear old Friend,—I have so little time for writing any thing but prescriptions in this busy place, that you will be surprised indeed to receive this. But your happiness is mine, and I can no longer keep secret what I know is in store for you. The twenty dollars that you in your simple benevolence slipped into the hands of the old gray-coat, has brought you interest indeed. That shabby was Sir William C——, the rich English banker, who diseased in body, and plunged into insane misanthrophy by the death of his wife, and of all save one of four children, to whom he was devotedly attached, spent this summer at the springs. At the urgent solicitation of his only son, a young man of most prepossessing manners and appearance, I had been for some time attending him, when you met him in the garden. Your kindness to him when you could not know him, his conversation with you, and your warm, humane nature made the greatest impression upon him, and so moved him that he was immediately afterward seized with a violent attack of illness, which proved a favorable crisis, and his health both of body and mind is completely restored. His gratitude to you knows no bounds. He is now, by my advice, traveling through Italy previous to coming to R——, where he intends to present himself at your door in his former shabby dress, and require at your hands the friendship you so generously proffered him. As for his son, ask your daughter, Theodora, she can tell you far more about him than I can. All this I should not have told you, but how could I help it? With the warmest congratulations, and repeated injunctions laid upon you to keep the secret from your wife and children better than I have been able to keep it from you, believe me, my dear old friend, truly yours,

Herman A——.”

It was long before the worthy pastor became convinced that all this was no dream, but when the reality burst upon him, he folded his hands, and his heart was filled with love and gratitude to God. “But,” said he to himself, “how can I keep all this from my dear Catharine? Heaven grant that that for the first time in my life I may keep my tongue between my teeth, and not betray every thing as my old friend here has done.”

“Father,” said his wife at supper, “your face shines like Moses, when he came down from the mount. What did the doctor write about?”

“Oh!—he—why of course about every thing that is going on at the springs, about the flowers, and my _Banksia serrata_.”

“And nothing,” asked Theodora, “of the old man and—and—”

“Why, what should he know of them?” said her father. “Doubtless the young fellow has forgotten our existence, dear Dora, but don’t be troubled, we are so happy here.” And then he bit his lips, and swallowed the secret as best he could, and as he was obliged to do fifty times a day.

Thus the autumn passed, the winter came, and with it that joyous time, which, for the sake of the dear child born long ago in Bethlehem, makes children of us all. But no news of the absent ones; only the intelligence from the capital that the count had sold his castle of R——, and that the new lord would take possession at Christmas.

“Well, well,” said the pastor, “the new lord can hardly be worse than the old one, and very easily better and more generous, so we may in future have a merrier Christmas than this will be, for this time, children, affairs look rather gloomy.”

“Ah! we know, father,” cried the joyous children. “You always say so—you always try to frighten us with the idea of no Christmas, but it always turns out well. Didn’t Ursula slip in yesterday evening, at the back-door, with a splendid Christmas tree? We didn’t see it, to be sure, but we heard it. And didn’t mother and Dora gild the apples and nuts, and cut out the stars yesterday evening? You thought we were in bed, but we peeped.”

“Well, well,” laughed their father; “to-morrow will be Christmas-eve, and of course you will go to bed bright and early, that you may be up in time the next morning.”

“No, no,” shouted the children; “to-morrow evening is just the time when the Christ-child comes to us. Have we not just seen Ursula making our Christmas-cake? Oh, dear, angel of a father, we will be so good.”

The next day all without was dreary and stormy; the heavy snow-flakes fell all day long, but within it was bright and cheerful. Ursula had swept and dusted every nook and corner of the house, and the fires all burned brightly. In the study the father and mother were busy all the morning; the children, meanwhile, looked wisely at one another, and tried to keep back the smiles that would dimple out every moment.

At three o’clock, according to the custom of the house, the holyday began. The fragrance of the fresh Christmas-cake was wafted through the house, mother and children were all dressed in their holyday attire, and the father, easy and happy that the morrow’s sermon was prepared, sat and smoked in his arm-chair. At four o’clock Theodora came in from the gardener’s, where she had been in all the storm to carry a slice of the Christmas-cake, with the intelligence that strangers had arrived at the village inn.

This news made the good pastor restless, and after pacing up and down the room, he went to the window, and rubbing the moisture from the pane, looked out. And there, just round the corner, crept the old man in the gray coat, with his hands behind him, as formerly, and he walked up the steps and knocked at the door. “Courage,” said the pastor to himself, and hastened out to meet him.

“Here I am,” said the old man, in a hollow voice, his looks bent on the ground, “I have fortunately arrived here at last, but I am weary and ill, and I have no one to pity me. Do you remember your kind words; will you take me in? What! No reply?”

The honest pastor could not reply. This was what he had so long looked forward to, and now he was really grieved that the kind heart of the old man could not enjoy the brief pleasure of his little surprise. But as he stood silently there, the old man raised his eyes, met that look of love and sorrow, and threw himself into his arms.

“No,” cried he, “no longer bent with age, but erect and strong—away with dissimulation! O my benefactor, I am—”

“Stay!” interrupted the pastor, “there shall indeed be no dissembling in this happy moment. Sir William C——, I know you. The doctor wrote me all about you.”

“Take me, then, to your wife and children; they are mine, you are mine, but you must take me for payment, and keep me for the rest of my life.”

“Hush!” said the pastor, “my wife and children know nothing of the secret, now see what they will say. Come in, dear guest, come in.”

“Ah!” cried Theodora, joyfully, “our old man from A——.”

The children gathered round, the mother welcomed him cordially, and seated him in the arm-chair by the bright fire.

Speechless he looked round upon them all, but kept Theodora’s hand in his while his gaze rested with evident satisfaction upon her lovely face.

“Light the colored Christmas candles, Catharine,” said the father, “and seat yourselves all round the table.”

Then he opened his desk, took from it the doctor’s letter, stroked his wife’s cheek, and said—

“Ah, Catharine, all this has weighed upon me like a mountain, but now all that I know, you, dear ones, shall know, too, and our guest here shall tell us whether it be true or no.”

And then he read the doctor’s letter. Let whoever can, imagine the variety of emotions that overcame all the listeners; the astonishment of the mother, the gentle emotion of the guest, the alternate red and white that overspread Theodora’s cheek, and the delight of the little ones.

“Here I am, dear ones,” said the old man, at the end of the reading, “and here I shall stay, in dear, cheerful Germany.”

“Where then is—is—” stammered Theodora.

But just then the door was flung open, and there stood Robert, his eyes beaming with love and joy.

“Oh, Robert! my Robert!” she cried, and would have rushed toward him, but overcome by her happiness, she sank into her mother’s arms. The old man took his son’s hand, and turning to the pastor, said,

“May I woo your daughter for my noble son?”

“May I,” continued Robert, “be your son, O, dear friend?”

“And may I say,” interrupted his father, “that I have bought the castle yonder, and that I beg your daughter’s acceptance of it as a bridal gift?”

“My son! my daughter!” cried the weeping parents, and embraced the lovers, while the children crowded round the old man.

“But now for supper!” cried the pastor, “if there is any one here who can ever eat again; and, mamma, pray see that it is a real Christmas feast.”

And then they seated themselves round the table, and the old man, looking round upon the happy faces about him, told how he had finished the tour of Italy, and had determined to live for the rest of his life in beautiful Germany. Then raising his glass, he drank a heartfelt toast to them all. “And I have ordered every thing for your comfort at the castle at Lee & Hammersmith’s, London; and for you, dear friend,” turning to the pastor, “the choicest collection of plants will arrive shortly.”

“Oh, heaven!” sighed the pastor, “How have I deserved this—the _Banksia serrata, Plumeria_, and divine _Strelitzia_.”

“How?” said his guest, holding up the purse which Seidelman had slipped into his hand at the springs; “see your twenty dollars here—the purse shall always remain in the family, and our posterity shall read what is embroidered upon it—‘Charity brings interest.’ But what makes the little ones so restless?”

“Ah!” said their father, “they want to go to bed;” and he and his wife quietly left the room.

“No, no!” cried the children, “now the holy child is coming, wait until we hear his little bell, and then we shall go, and you, brother Robert, and all.”

And soon the longed-for bell sounded, the children rushed into the study, and bore along the older ones with them.

There was the Christmas heaven before them, with its shining lights and stars. Theodora sprang forward to take from the table her new white dress, and forgot her castle. Hermine danced round her new work-box, Ernst round his tool-chest, and Paul was immediately absorbed with his terrific cannon, and new troops of soldiers.

The mother, coming behind the pastor, slipped on him his new dressing-gown, and he uncovered the corner of the table, where were her pretty slippers and muff.

“O, ye happy ones,” said Sir William, with tears of real feeling, “how easy would it be for me to cover this table with gold, and say, ‘Take it—it is all yours,’ but could it give you one moment of the happiness that these simple gifts of love afford you. O let me be a child with you!”

“Yes, yes, we will all be children,” cried they, and embraced each other, while the pastor raised his eyes to heaven, and blessed them, saying, “Of such is the kingdom of heaven.”

* * * * *

SONNET.—LIGHT.

How beauteous art thou, sacred light! How sweet To view thee gushing from the golden sun, As he his morning race begins to run! Than time or thought alone, thou art less fleet— Where shall we seek thy primal dwelling-place? About His throne, who ever girt with thee, Lay on the bosom of eternity; Who lit the stars, which radiate through space— Lo! from the east in billowy tide thou flowest, Gilding the hill-tops and the heavenly spires— Empurpling ocean with a myriad fires— Great light, thou sun! o’er heaven thou proudly goest; Nor ever standest still, as once, of old, Till setting thou hast bathed all with thy molten gold.

A.

* * * * *

UNSPOKEN.

BY A. J. REQUIER.

As, sometimes, the tumultuary deep Sinks to serene repose, When sunset visions o’er its bosom creep As o’er a couch of rose;

So, sometimes, the bright Caspian of the soul Is sudden hushed and stilled, As with the glow of some wild hope as goal Its trancéd depths are filled.

“Maid of the twilight eyes! that musest late What star breaks on thy brow With the resplendence of a Heavenly Gate, Greeting its angel now?”

The humid azure of her virgin dream, Spanned from the realms above By an all-dazzling Iris! thought—trust—theme— Life-consecration—Love!

Come with me to the rustic paths and see A mute scene eloquent; That rude cot, reared where the daisied lea Is with the mountain blent.

A form of lovely womanhood which bends O’er a much daintier thing— Eyes fixed with something that so far transcends The strength of shattered suffering.

Armed Cæsar, with his legions, dared not break Their concentration wild; Life ventured—periled on a single stake! And won:—her first born child!

Come with me where the artist-hand hath wrought The crown of all its toil— The spiritual idol madly sought In the hot brain’s turmoil;

Come where the monumental dead have laid Their thrice-anointed dust— Where priest and martyr, bard and sage, have paid The debt all mortals must;

Come where the spells of wizard Nature wrest Sublimity from sod— Where Lohmon gleams in paradisal rest, Niagara preaches God;

Come thou and learn, the inmost glow of soul Hath no terrestial token; And that, while Polar Oceans freeze and roll, It never can be spoken!

* * * * *

TO A DANDELION.

BY ERASTUS W. ELLSWORTH.

Thy face, my friend, is beauty-pale, And doth a slender sweet exhale, And here is but a homely vale, And fancy draws No dearness out of song or tale, In thine applause;

And some there are who only prize The blossoms wooed from foreign skies, In odors drenched and dewy dyes, But thou shalt be Companion to my fonder eyes, And kin to me.

When I shall praise a flower the more Because its gilded portals pour The sweetness of a foreign shore, I’ll jog with those Who drop the rhyme’s laborious oar, And flow in prose.

All themes that Love and Honor use, All tender, soul-inspiring views, And all the raptures of the muse, Howe’er we roam, Like the sweet Grace that shuns abuse Begin at home.

And where my steps are frequent led— In beaten haunts—where’er I tread, Are seeds of wit and wisdom spread, That not abound, Only because my heart and head Are stony ground.

Thou claimant of a mutual birth Poor kinsman of a fickle hearth, Flower of the bleak New England earth, I cannot deem Your modest crown so little worth In my esteem.

When spring returning, odor-sweet, Touches the turf with tinsel feet, Thy fresh rosette once more we meet, By sun or shade, Like Joy to smiles, with generous greet, Or just displayed.

But soon thy little youth is gone, Thy ample-headed age comes on, And thou a standing wig dost don, Of seedy hair, Frayed by the winds, till bald as stone, Thy skull is bare.

Ye sacred, sweet, sonorous Nine— Dear Floras of the bowers divine— Should Age discrown my sable twine Of hairy weed, Give me to say—This pate of mine Has gone to seed.

* * * * *

WHY DO I WEEP FOR THEE?

WORDS BY GEORGE LINLEY. COMPOSED BY W. V. WALLACE. SUNG BY MISS CATHARINE HAYES.

Published by permission of Lee & Walker, 162 Chestnut Street, _Publishers and Importers of Music and Musical Instruments_.

Why do I weep for thee? Why weep in my sad dreams? Parted for aye are we, Yes! parted like mountain streams.

Yet with me lingers still That word, that one last word, Thy voice, thy voice yet seems to thrill The heart’s fond chord. Why do I weep for thee? Why do I weep for thee?

II.

Once, ah! what joy to share With thee the noontide hour; Then, not a grief nor care Had canker’d the heart’s young flow’r The sun seems not to shed A radiance o’er me now, Save mem’ry all seems dead, Since lost, since lost art thou. Why do I weep for thee? Why do I weep for thee?

* * * * *

REVIEW OF NEW BOOKS.

_Aylmere, or the Bondman of Kent; and Other Poems. By Robert T. Conrad. 1 Vol. Philadelphia; E. H. Butler & Co._

The author of this volume is one of those rare organizations, intellectually, which have the power of transmuting whatever they touch into gold. As an orator, he sways his audience at will; as a writer, he storms the reader’s judgment by logic and declamation welded into one; and as a poet, he now charms the fancy with the grace and delicacy of his imagery, and now makes the heart throb with his fiery and impassioned words.

“Aylmere” is a dramatic poem, originally written for Mr. Forrest, and still played, under the name of “Jack Cade,” by that eminent tragedian. Though parts of it may derive additional power, on the stage, from the magnificent bursts of the great actor for whom it was composed, the true beauty of the drama, we think, can only be enjoyed by those who peruse it, at leisure, in the closet. Many passages, indeed, are suppressed on the boards, in order to bring the play within accustomed limits; and the benefit of these the spectator loses entirely.

The drama of “Aylmere” is founded on the famous insurrection of 1450, in which the English peasantry were headed by a physician, known indifferently as Jack Cade, Aylmere, Mendall and Mortimer. The theme is one peculiarly fitted for a republican poet. Goaded by intolerable wrongs, social as well as political—insults to their women, contumely to themselves, public taxes that reaped them to the last stubble, and private exactions on the part of the nobility, that gleaned what little regal rapacity had left—the people, in which we comprise the yeomen and burghers, as well as the villeins, rose in a body, marched on London, exacted the death of the infamous lord-chamberlain, and procured a charter from the king, guarantying to the commonalty the rights and privileges demanded by their leader. But scarcely had these concessions been granted, when a collision, provoked probably by the royal party, occurred between the citizens of London and the followers of Cade: the insurgents met with a repulse; and the late terrified aristocracy rallying, a total defeat and dispersion of the peasantry ensued. Aylmere himself was hunted down, like a wild beast, and mercilessly put to death. The concessions granted were revoked. And, for centuries after, English historians in the interest of the upper classes, blackened the name and misrepresented the motives of the ill-fated Kentish reformer.

What nobler task could a republican poet set before himself, than to rescue the reputation of this martyred hero from obloquy and shame? Well, too, has Judge Conrad fulfilled his pious labor. The principal character of the play is Aylmere, of course; indeed he may be said, in one sense, to be the entire play. His lofty courage, his abhorrence of wrong, his high aspirations after liberty, and the fiery enthusiasm which he breathes into his followers, form, as it were, the deep undertone, whose thunders roll incessantly through this grand anthem of freedom. Other characters, however, contribute materially to the action of the piece, and furnish the author with opportunities to display his dramatic powers. The portrait of Marianne, the wife of Aylmere, is drawn with great tenderness of feeling, and delicacy of touch: she is, like her own native Italy, a vision of immortal beauty hallowed and sanctified by wo. The cruel, vindictive and insolent Say; the gay, careless, yet not wholly wicked Clifford; the friend of the people, Friar Lacy; and the yeomen, Wat Worthy and Will Mowbray, all stand prominently out from the canvas.

The drama is full of noble poetry. It would give us pleasure to quote more largely from it, in proof of this; but the quantity of books upon our table, requiring notice, forbids a monopoly of our limited space by one. We cannot, however, resist making a few extracts. Here is one, in which Aylmere, after his return from Italy, eloquently describes the bondage which he shared in common with his fellow-Englishmen.

Ten years of freedom have not made me free. I’ve throttled fortune till she yielded up Her brightest favors; I have wooed Ambition, Wooed with a fiery soul and dripping sword, And _would not_ be denied; I turned from her, And raked amid the ashes of the past, For the high thoughts that burn but cannot die, Until my spirit walked with those who now Are hailed, as brethren, by archangels:—_Yet,_ _Have I come home a slave—a thing for chains_ _And scourges—ay, a dog,_ _Crouching, and spurned, and spit upon._

In fine contrast to this picture, is the following one of Italy, _as Italy was four centuries ago_.

’Tis free; and want, fear, shame, are aliens there. In that blest land the tiller is a prince. No ruffian lord breaks spring’s fair promises; And summer’s toils—for freedom watches o’er them— Are safe and happy; summer lapses by, In its own music; And pregnant Autumn, with a matron blush, Comes stately in, and with her, hand in hand, Labor, and busy Plenty. Then old Winter, With his stout glee, his junkets, and a laugh That shakes from his hoar beard the icicles, Makes the year gay again. There are no poor Where freedom is.

The whole of the following is in the same fine strain.

_Worthy._ Behold! He comes! he comes!

_Enter_ Aylmere.

_Lacy._ Thank Heaven! thou’rt free!

_Aylmere_, (_laughs._) Ay, once more free! within my grasp a sword, And round me freemen! Free! as is the storm About your hills; the surge upon your shore! Free as the sunbeams on the chainless air; Or as the stream that leaps the precipice, And in eternal thunder, shouts to Heaven, That it is free, and will be free forever!

_Straw._ Now for revenge! Full long we’ve fed on wrong: Give us revenge!

_Aylmere._ For you and for myself! England from all her hills, cries out for vengeance! The serf, who tills her soil, but tastes not of Her fruit, the slave that in her dungeon groans, The yeoman plundered, and the maiden wronged, Echo the call in shrieks! The angry waves Report the sound in thunder; and the heavens, From their blue vaults, roll back a people’s cry For liberty and vengeance!

_Lacy._ Wrong on wrong! Are there no bolts in heaven?

_Aylmere._ _No swords on earth?_ _He’ll ever be a slave, who does not right_ _Himself. The heavens fight not for cravens. Let us strike,_ _Strike for ourselves, and Heaven will strike for us._

The ensuing are nervous and striking.

All would o’ertop their fellows; And every rank—the lowest—hath its height To which hearts flutter, with as large a hope As princes feel for empire! But in each, Ambition struggles with a sea of hate. He who sweats up the ridgy grades of life. Finds, in each station, icy scorn above, Below him hooting envy.

My lord, if you seek power in this, remember, The greatness which is born of anarchy, And thrown aloft in tumult, cannot last. It mounts, like rocks hurled skyward by volcanoes, Flushes a guilty moment, and falls back In the red earthquake’s bosom.

The tragedy violates, in some of its details, the facts of history. Thus Aylmere, instead of being defeated and betrayed, as in the real story, perishes, in the drama, at the very hour that the charter is granted. The change enables the author to give a fine artistic scene as his closing one. Marianne, the wife, having been separated from her husband at the outset of the insurrection, falls into the power of Lord Say. While thus a prisoner she is accosted with dishonorable proposals by Lord Clifford, whom she stabs to escape indignity. For this heroic act she is thrown into the castle dungeon, scourged, and visited with other brutalities, till she loses her reason. Escaping eventually, she rejoins her husband. In Aylmere’s last interview with Lord Say, when the latter, dying, poniards the former, she rushes in, her intellect restored, as is often the case before death, and perishes with her lord. This furnishes the material for the closing scene, which is most dramatically conceived. Clasping the fair corpse in his arms, the hero is himself sinking into death, when suddenly loud huzzas in the street, call him back to life. He starts up with a wild cry of exultation, and asks eagerly what it means. The attendants reply, “the charter!” and, as they speak, the parchment, duly sealed, is brought triumphantly in. Aylmere rushes to it, kisses it, clasps it to his bosom, and exclaiming that the bondmen are avenged and England free, totters toward Marianne, falls, and dies.

But the drama is not the only poem in the volume, for some fifty fugitive pieces ensue, the chance contributions of a life devoted generally to pursuits more stern. Several of the last of these originally appeared in the pages of this magazine: we may mention “The Sons of the Wilderness,” and the “Sonnets on the Lord’s Prayer.” Generally they are distinguished by great felicity of expression, a vigorous imagination, touches of exquisite pathos, and a lofty scorn of whatever is base, cruel, or wrong. As examples of the gentler mood of the author’s muse, we would point out two poems, which evidently relate to a mother and her daughter: the first, “Lines on the death of a Young Married Lady,” and the second, “To Maggie.” The sonnet, “To My Wife,” is also very beautiful. As specimens of Judge Conrad’s more indignant mood, we refer to the sonnets, “On the Invasion of the Roman Republic,” and to “Fear.”

The poem, “To My Brother,” is one that would have made the author’s reputation, even if he had written nothing else; and “Freedom” contains stanzas that but few other living poets could have penned. To say that it exhibits the power of the fourth canto of “Childe Harold,” would imply imitation, of which certainly no one can accuse Judge Conrad. But we may remark that it has the same nervous style, the same exalted imagination, with an original conception that is all its own. In perusing this and other poems in this volume we instinctively regret that Judge Conrad has not devoted himself entirely to poetry. Such powers as his, concentrated on a pursuit so congenial to him, could not but have produced results that would have adorned American literature, not only temporarily, but throughout all time.

We cannot take leave of our author without going back to the dedication, which is addressed to the poet’s father, and which, though often quoted in print since the appearance of the book, we venture to quote again.

TO JOHN CONRAD, ESQ.

How much that Young Time gave hath Old Time ta’en; Snatching his blessings back with churlish haste, And leaving life a wreck-encumbered waste! And yet I murmur not—for you remain! You and my mother, and the hoarded wealth Of home, and love, and high and hearted thought, Which Youth in Memory’s wizard woof enwrought. These are “laid up” where Time’s ungentle stealth Can reach them not. And ’tis a joy to bring This humble garland, woven in the wild. Back to the hearth and roof-tree of the child: The wearied heart bears home its offering. If it relume the approving smile of yore— Guerdon and glory then—father, I crave no more.

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_Poems. By Richard Henry Stoddard. Boston: Ticknor, Reed & Fields. 1 vol. 16mo._

It is impossible to open this volume at any page without feeling that the author is a poet, and a poet whose promise is very much greater even than his performance. Every poem is bright and warm with imagery and feeling—poetical expressions are showered with a liberal hand—the verse has that soft and fluent movement which indicates that the thoughts they convey come from a teeming mind in a gush of melodious sentiment—and the impression left on the reader’s imagination is of a singularly rich, sensuous, fertile and poetical nature. Every poem, almost every line, is a protest against the prose of thought and the prose of life, and all the objects of sense are studiously idealized and heightened into “something rich” if not into “something strange.” The author seems to dwell in a dream of life, peopled with beauties if not with Beauty, and sweetly abandoning himself to the soft and subtle sensations they imaginatively excite. Pleasure, but a pleasure more than mortal, seems to be his aim and aspiration, and infinitely provoked is he when the hard facts of life protrude their misshapen but solid substance into his meditations, and mock his luxurious illusion.

Now the mood out of which this profuse idealization of thoughts and sensations proceeds is undoubtedly poetical, but it should be exhibited in connection with higher and sterner qualities, and at best indicates the youth of the poetic vision and faculty. But, it must be admitted, that Mr. Stoddard has represented it in all its deliciousness, and no person can read his volume without being filled and stimulated with its sweetness and melody, and luxuriant fancy and opulence of sensuous forms and images. It indicates, to some extent, a sensitive and imaginative nature overmastered by the pleasant scenes and airy beings in which and with whom it revels—possessed instead of possessing—and therefore lacking that individual power which wields dominion over its own resources, selects, discriminates, rejects, governs, and, in the highest sense, combines and creates. Accordingly he does not inform objects, but is rather informed by them—does not pass into them by an internal force but is rather drawn into them by their external attraction—and thus leaves an impression rather of fertility than power. There is a great difference between the poet who merges himself in objects, and the poet who allows objects to immerge him. In the one case he is a victor, in the other a captive.

As a result of this exceeding sensitiveness to impressions, Mr. Stoddard is open to the influence of other poets; for when a poet once ceases to exercise a jealous guardianship over the individuality of his genius, he is liable to be overcome by the superior power of the natures with whom he sympathises. Now, Mr. Stoddard is no copyist or imitator, much less a plagiarist, but he evidently has an intense love for the genius of Shelley, Keats and Tennyson, and sympathises so deeply with them that he catches the tone and tune of their spirits—sometimes sets his own songs to their music—and thus gives us original thoughts and images that _sound_ like theirs because conceived in their spirit. Thus in the “Castle in the Air” there is an original line which still has the mark of Shelley’s individuality upon it:

“Like some divinest dream upon the couch of sleep.”

It would be easy to select many more illustrations of this unconscious imitation, proving, not that Mr. Stoddard is a borrower, but that he is not on his guard against the magnetic power of other minds, exercised as it is through the most subtile avenues of mental influence. It should be his ambition not to differ in degree from the poets he loves, but to differ in _kind_. It is better to be Stoddard than to be a Tennysonian, especially, as in the present case, when Stoddard contains within himself the elements of a new individuality in letters, with a force and flavor and fragrance of his own.

We have been thus prolix and minute in characterizing some of the peculiarities of this volume, because we are convinced that the author is a man of genius, and has a right to be tried by laws of criticism severer than those which apply to the common run of versifiers. But we are not insensible to the excellencies of the poems; willingly plead guilty to the charge of having read the volume with delight, and trust that we shall entice many of our readers into the same pleasant employment. They evince thought, sentiment, fancy, imagination, delicacy and depth of nature; every thing but directing will and a broad perception of the true poetical relations of the ideal and the actual; and these will come with the growth of his mind, and a larger and more genial experience of life. We had marked many passages to illustrate our idea both of his merits and his defects, but we have no space at present to quote them. The gorgeous “Castle in the Air,” the leading poem in the volume, would furnish many a splendid example of the fluency and fertility of his genius. “The Witch’s Whelp” is an original conception of a different kind. The Songs and Sonnets, toward the close of the volume, are perhaps, the most individual and essentially original poems of the collection, and some of them display uncommon subtilty and sharpness of mental vision.

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_A Book of Romances, Lyrics and Songs. By Bayard Taylor. Boston: Ticknor, Read & Fields, 1 vol. 16mo._

Bayard Taylor’s peculiarities as a poet are the same which have won him so much popularity as a man, and refer to his character as well as his mind. Fine, however as is the impression conveyed by his numerous prose works, we think that no reader can carefully peruse the present volume without feeling that the best embodiment of the man is in these poems. They are thoroughly genuine, recording the thoughts and aspirations nearest and dearest to the author’s heart and brain, and o’erinformed with the life of a thoughtful, imaginative and genial nature. Some of them are darkened by a recent affliction, and to those friends who know how deep and acute that affliction was, they can hardly be read without tears. But the majority of the poems express the essential happiness of the author’s spirit, and communicate happiness to the reader. That descriptive power, which has made him one of the most fascinating of modern writers of travels, is of course active in the present volume in its most exquisite form. Indeed, as a poet, he does not so much describe as represent scenery, picturing it forth to the imagination in words and images which seem the mental counterparts of the objects before his eye. As a descriptive poet alone, he would rank high among contemporary authors, but he is also a close and subtle observer of the operations of thought and passion, as modified by individual character, and numerous pieces in this volume indicate intensity and concentration of thought, exercised on some of the most elusive and etherial laws and facts of the spiritual nature. In addition to all this, his style of expression is pure, energetic and picturesque, and varies readily with his themes. The best poem in the volume, and one which we think has good pretensions to be ranked with American classics, is “Man-da-Min, or the Romance of the Maize,” an Indian legend of great beauty, and, in Taylor’s version, exquisite in idea and masterly in execution. “Hylas,” “Taurus,” “The Summer Camp,” “The Odalisque,” “The Pine Forest of Monterey,” and “The Waves,” are likewise of great merit, and exhibit the variety as well as power of the author’s mind. Cordially do we wish success to this volume, and trust that Taylor will live to write, and we to welcome many like it.

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_The Home Book of the Picturesque, or American Scenery, Art and Literature; with Thirteen Engravings on Steel, from Pictures by Eminent Artists, Engraved expressly for this Work. New York: George P. Putnam. 1 vol. folio._

The American public have become so accustomed to Mr. Putnam’s enterprise, that they may not be surprised even by this splendid example of it—a volume essentially American, yet in engravings, letter-press, and general execution equal to the best English annuals, and in the merits of its literary matter far superior to them. The cost and trouble of getting up the book may be conceived, when we mention that the pictures from which the exquisite illustrations of the volume are engraved, are scattered among many collectors, and that the execution of the plates exhibits the utmost skill and finish which the art of engraving has reached in America. The essays which accompany the engravings are by what old Jacob Tonson called “eminent hands.” Irving contributes a paper on the “Catskill Mountains,” which seems like an essay accidently left out of the “Sketch Book,” and is certainly worthy of a place among the most charming productions of his genius. Cooper’s article on “American and European Scenery,” is a carefully meditated and attractive disquisition on a subject which has occasioned endless discussion, but which was never treated so thoroughly and temperately before. Tuckerman’s “Over the Mountains” is an admirable essay. “Scenery and Mind,” by Magoun, is the most eloquent, thoughtful, scholarly and tasteful of his productions. Willis contributes a brilliant and sensible paper on “The Highland Terrace,” in his most fascinating style. The artists whose landscapes make the beauty of the volume, are Durand, Huntington, Beekwith, Talbot, Kensett, Cropsey, Richards, Church, Weir, Cole and Gignoux.

Altogether, the volume is the best exhibition of American art in connection with American literature we have ever seen, and must take the lead among the gift-books of the season.

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_The Human Body and its Connection with Man, Illustrated by the Principal Organs. By John James Garth Wilkinson. Member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. Philadelphia: Lippincott, Grambo & Co. 1 vol. 12mo._

The author of this curious and attractive volume is well-known as the English editor of Swedenborg’s works, and the writer of Swedenborg’s life, and, in the opinion of Emerson, is “a philosophic critic, with a co-equal vigor of understanding and imagination comparable only to Lord Bacon’s.” Without attempting to discuss the accuracy of this opinion, which is at least the result of a study of Mr. Wilkinson’s whole works, it is sufficient to say here that the author of this volume is one of the most vivid, pointed and striking writers of the century; and that, however solid or doubtful may be his pretensions to great scientific merits, there can be no doubt of the brilliancy of his rhetoric and the fertility of his intellect in original thoughts. A review of the present work we do not intend to give, but simply recommend it to all readers as a powerful, independent, suggestive and stimulating book, lifting the study of anatomy and physiology into a fine art, and abounding with new views both of the body and the mind. The chief peculiarity of Mr. Wilkinson seems to us to be a singular vigor and audacity of will, in some cases running into offensive dogmatism, but generally exercised in freeing his intellect from the trammels both of accredited skepticisms and authorities, and in stamping his own opinions with such force upon the mind of the reader, as to create himself into a kind of authority. There is muscular health and strength in every sentence of his remarkable book, and a seeming gladness in the exercise of his faculties which is wonderfully inspiring to the reader.

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_The Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys. By Nathaniel Hawthorne. With Engravings by Baker from Designs by Billings. Boston: Ticknor, Reed & Fields. 1 vol. 16mo._

Hawthorne may have written more powerful stories than those contained in this volume, but none so truly delightful. The spirit of the book is so essentially sunny and happy, that it creates a jubilee in the brain as we read. It is intended for children, but let not the intention cheat men and women out of the pleasure they will find in its sparkling and genial pages. The stories are told by a certain Eustice Bright to a mob of children, whose real names the author suppresses, but whom he re-baptizes with the fairy appellation of Primrose, Periwinkle, Sweet Fern, Dandelion, Blue-Eye, Clover, Huckleberry, Cowslip, Squash-blossom, Milk-weed, Plantain and Butter-cup. The individuality of these little creatures is happily preserved, especially in the criticisms and applications they make after each story is told; and the reader parts with them unwillingly, and with the hope (which the author should not disappoint) of resuming their acquaintance in another volume. The stories, six in number, are classical myths, re-cast to suit the author’s purpose, and told with exquisite grace, simplicity and playfulness. The book will become the children’s classic, and, to our taste, is fairly the best of its kind in English literature. It is a child’s story-book informed with the finest genius.

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_The Captains of the Old World, as Compared with the Great Modern Strategists, their Campaigns, Characters and Conduct, from the Persian to the Punic Wars. By Henry William Herbert. New York: Charles Scribner. 1 vol. 12mo._

This volume is all alive and glowing with the fiery characteristics of Mr. Herbert’s genius, while it has at the same time the best results of his earnest, independent thinking, and profound and accurate scholarship. The title sufficiently declares its purpose, and its execution is worthy of the theme. It gives a most animated account of the Greek and Roman tactics and military organization, and of the lives of the great ancient commanders, commencing with Miltiades and ending, for the present, with Hannibal. Themistocles, Pausanius, Xenophon, Epaminondas and Alexander, are learnedly and eloquently sketched, and parallels are drawn between them and the celebrated captains of modern times, in which the author shows a knowledge of military science as well as his usual power of vivid painting. The work is dedicated to Professor Felton, of Harvard University. It cannot fail to have that wide circulation which it so eminently merits, for it happily combines elements of interest which will recommend it equally to scholars and the mass of readers.

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_The Life of John Sterling. By Thomas Carlyle. Boston: Phillips, Sampson & Co. 1 vol. 12mo._

This is one of the most powerful of Carlyle’s many productions, and, as a biography, is to be ranked among the best in English literature. It bristles as usual with the author’s harsh scorn of every thing he is pleased to call cant, falsehood, and moonshine; but there are glimpses in it of deep and genuine tenderness, and, of all his works, it best indicates the humanity of the man. The mental characteristics of Sterling himself, are drawn with a loving and friendly yet discriminating pencil, and the few events of his life are narrated with singular skill. The sketches of Sterling’s friends and contemporaries, especially the portrait of Coleridge, add much to the interest of the volume. There are specimens also of a sort of savage humor equal to Carlyle’s best efforts in that kind. The style, though full of vigor and flashing with imagery, is as craggy and uneven as ever; exhibiting, in the constant recurrence of a few slang words, how formal after all is this inveigher against formulas, and how his hatred of affectation becomes itself a sort of cant. But the soul of the book is sound and manly; and no one can read it without feeling that he has been in communion with a deep and great, if somewhat embittered nature.

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_Putnam’s Home Cyclopedia Hand-book of the Useful Arts. By T. Antisell, M. D. New York: George P. Putnam. 1 vol. 12 mo._

_Hand-Book of Universal Biography. By Parke Godwin. New York: George P. Putnam. 1 vol. 12mo._

These volumes belong to a series of six, each complete in itself, under the general title of “Putnam’s Home Cyclopedia.” They will be found very useful and valuable to all classes of readers, containing a vast amount of classified information in the most compact form. The Hand-Book of the Useful Arts should be in the possession of every mechanic in the country. The Universal Biography, by Parke Godwin, is based on Maunder’s book on the same subject, but re-written, extended, corrected, and in every way improved. The whole series will make an invaluable library of reference. Each volume contains some eight or nine hundred closely printed pages.

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_The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World, from Marathon to Waterloo. By E. S. Creasy, M. A. New York: Harper & Brothers. 1 vol. 12mo._

The idea of this valuable volume is taken from a remark of Hallam on Charles Martel’s victory over the invading Saracens, which he calls one of “those few battles, of which a contrary event would have essentially varied the drama of the world in all its subsequent scenes.” Mr. Creasy is Professor of History in University College, London, and is well fitted to do justice to his great theme. The battles described are Marathon, Syracuse, Arbela, and Metaurus; the victory of Arminius over the Roman legions under Varus; the battles of Chalons, Tours, and Hastings; Joan of Arc’s victory at Orleans, the defeat of the Spanish Armada, and the battles of Blenheim, Pultowa, Saratoga, Valmy, and Waterloo. The execution of the work is excellent. The liberality of the author’s mind is indicated by his lofty conception of the power and the mission of the United States, given in the introductory remarks to his description of the battle of Saratoga.

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_Legends of the Flowers. By Susan Pindar. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1 vol. 16mo._

_Memoirs of a London Doll. Boston: Ticknor, Reed & Fields. 1 vol. 16mo._

_Tales from Catland, for Little Kittens. By an Old Tabby. Boston: Ticknor & Co. 1 vol. 16mo._

These beautiful little volumes are designed for children, and are admirably adapted for their purpose of delighting the young. The stories display ingenuity of invention, and a talent for reaching the minds of children of no ordinary character. The engravings are uncommonly well executed. Those in Ticknor & Co.’s books are from designs by Billings.

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_A Class Book of Chemistry. By Edward L. Youmans. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1 vol. 12mo._

A capital volume, designed chiefly for academies and schools, but containing matter more important to readers in general than even to school-boys. It is a work in which the leading principles of chemistry are familiarly explained, and applied to the arts, agriculture, physiology, dietetics, ventilation, and the phenomena of nature. The writer is well qualified for his task, for he seems perfectly to comprehend the ignorance of the majority of readers on the subjects he explains, and accordingly directs his explanations primarily to exactly those principles which require illustration, before the mind is fitted to take in their applications.

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_Lives of the Queens of Scotland and English Princesses Connected with the Royal Succession of Great Britain. By Agnes Strickland, Author of the Lives of the Queens of England. Vol. 2. New York: Harper & Brothers. 12mo._

This volume contains the lives of Mary of Lorraine, the second queen of James V., and Lady Margaret Douglas, Countess of Lenox. These biographies are quite able and interesting, giving vivid pictures of Scottish feuds, life, and manners in the sixteenth century, and exhibiting considerable research into the interior history of the time. The next volume will, we presume, be devoted to Mary, Queen of Scots.

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_Sir Roger de Coverley. By the Spectator. Boston: Ticknor, Reed & Fields. 1 vol. 16mo._

Addison’s Sir Roger is as universally known and appreciated as any creation of the comic genius of England; but the papers in the Spectator which refer to him have never before been collected in a volume by themselves. This is done in the present delightful work, and we commend it to our readers as a gem both of typography and genius.

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_Sketches in Ireland. By W. M. Thackeray. Philadelphia: T. B. Peterson._

This work abounds with the finest touches of the author’s satirical pencil, and for close observation of life, is worthy of the fame of the author of “Vanity Fair.” The accompanying illustrations are from drawings made upon the spot by the author, and are, some of them, ludicrous enough.

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_Crosby and Nichols, of Boston_, have sent us some eight or ten delightful little story-books for children, to which we call the attention of parents in these holyday times.

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Dentistry.—Our attention has recently been called to the very superior mechanical execution of full sets of teeth, manufactured by a young townsman of ours—J. Sothoron Gilliams, Esq.—which in all respects surpass any thing of the kind we have elsewhere observed. Doctor Gilliams, however, brings to the practice of his profession, not only the nice observation of years of the superior skill of his father, but also a thorough medical education and assiduous attention to the mechanical arrangement and finish of his labors. It is a mistaken notion—but one that is common—to suppose, that a poor shoemaker or an indifferent tailor may make a very tolerable dentist, and we are sure that a few more examples of thorough education for the practice of the profession, such as Dr. Gilliams has secured, will do much to send adrift the vast army of pretenders and quacks who now torture and fleece humanity as surgeon dentists. It is strange, that while no man would thoughtlessly put a horse into the hands of one of these fellows, yet people are to be found who will allow them to afflict and disfigure the mouths of their daughters with perfect indifference. We trust, however, that among the many thousands who read “Graham” none will hereafter suffer themselves to be duped by ignorant pretenders, with high-sounding titles, while gentlemen of education and superior skill—but who modestly keep silent—are in the midst of us.

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The Volume for 1852.—Our readers will see from the style in which the January number is put forth, that we are in earnest for 1852 in our efforts to render “Graham” superior as a work of literature and art. The plan marked out and indicated in our prospectus of greatly increasing the literary matter of each number, we shall resolutely adhere to, and as we claim the merit of first suggesting and adopting the change, we trust that those who partially follow us in January, will not grow weary in well-doing as soon as the subscriptions have been made up for the year.

How far our readers may have opportunities of observing the practice of some publishers, who fill sheets with promises which are never thought of after the January number is issued, we cannot say—but we now ask some little attention to the matter for 1852.

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Transcriber’s Notes:

Table of Contents has been added for reader convenience. Archaic spellings and hyphenation have been retained. Obvious typesetting and punctuation errors have been corrected without note. Other errors have been corrected as noted below. For illustrations, some caption text may be missing or incomplete due to condition of the originals available for preparation of the eBook.

page 18, the Boynton’s; and he ==> the Boyntons; and he page 89, in the which state one of ==> in which state one of page 104, knew work-box, ==> new work-box,

[End of Graham’s Magazine, Vol. XL, No. 1, January 1852]