Part 1

GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE. Vol. XL. April, 1852. No. 4.

Contents

Fiction, Literature and Articles

Optical Phenomena The First Age Impressions of England in the Autumn of 1851 Oliver Goldsmith—His Character and Genius A Life of Vicissitudes (continued) The Bower of Castle Mount A Reply to Dwight’s Article on Mozart’s Don Giovanni A True Irish Story The Condor Hunt What Glory Costs the Nation Eminent Young Men.—No. I The Game of the Season Was the World Made Out of Nothing? A Literary Gossip with Miss Mitford The Two Isabels; Or Coquettish Seventeen Review of New Books Graham’s Small-Talk

Poetry and Music

The Forest Fountain Love Memory The Last Song April Away Song Mona Lisa To a Canary Bird Faded and Gone Song of the Spirit of the North Sonnet.—Art The Autograph of God If I Were a Smile To Miss Light Underwood Beautie Lines on Some Violets The Destruction of Sodom Sorrento A Thought of the Future The Black Huntsman Sweet Sunny Isle

Transcriber’s Notes can be found at the end of this eBook.

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GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE.

Vol. XL. PHILADELPHIA, APRIL, 1852. No. 4.

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THE FOREST FOUNTAIN.

BY IGNATIUS L. DONNELLY.

Here the sinking sun hath broken through a forest close as night; Plashing all the deepened darkness with its thick and wine-like light. Shivered lies the broad, red sunbeam slant athwart the withered leaf, Laughing back the startled shadows from their high and holy grief; Down yon dusk-pool, slant, obliquely, shoots a line like sparry splinter, As the waking flush of spring-time lightens up the eyes in winter: Dimming as it straineth downward melts the red light of the sun, Darkling pool and piercing beamlet mingling whitely into one. Fallen rays, like broken crystals, spangle thick the shadowy ground, Ragged fragments, glorious gushes scattered richly, redly round. Where the lazy lilies languish, one intruding sunbeam creeps; In the arms of slumberous shadow, like a child it sinks and sleeps; And the quiet leaves around it seem to think it all their own, ’Mid the grass and lightened lilies sleeping silent and alone. Here the dew-damp lingers longest ’mid the plushy fountain moss; Here the bergamot’s red blossom leans the stilly stream across; Here the shade is darkly silent; here the breeze is liquid cool, And the very air seems married to the freshness of that pool. See, where down its depths pellucid, Nature’s purest waters well, Breaking up in curving current, wimpled line and bubbly swell; While in swift and noiseless beauty, through the deep and dewy grass, O’er the rock and down the valley, see the hurrying waters pass. Oh, how dreamy grow my senses, as I couch me ’mid the flowers, Oh, how still the blue sky looketh, oh, how noteless creep the hours; Oh, how wide the silence seemeth, not a sound disturbing comes, Save a drowsy, sleepy buzzing, that around continuous hums; And I seem to float out loosely on weak slumber’s languid breast, With a kind of half reluctance that sinks gradually to rest. Distant faces group around me, kindly eyes look in my own, And I hear, though indistinctly, voices of the lost and gone: His whose bark went down in tempest; his whose life and death were gloom; His whose hopes and young ambitions fell and faded on the tomb; Oh, again his earnest language breaks upon my dreaming ear, And I catch the tones that waking I shall never, never hear.

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LOVE.

BY A. J. REQUIER.

Oh, with more than the pilgrim of Mecca’s devotion, When he looks on the shrine which his worship endears, Is the glance which we cast at the young heart’s devotion, Its first rose of summer—the last which it bears; Bright as a halo of sunshine reposing At break of the morn on a billowless stream, Where the wavering shadows are fitfully moving, Or blush of a Peri that smiles in a dream.

Thus, thus must thou dwell on each glance of affection, Each token of love I have strewed at thy shrine, When thy bosom first heaved at the fear of detection, And its secret alone was imparted to mine; It is linked with each thought that is born in thy waking, It embosoms each fancy that softens thy sleep, And, if e’er it be wild as the waves in their breaking, ’Tis the image of Heaven that breaks on the deep!

For vainly the bosom whose pulses have throbbed To the beat of a heart it had warmed with its fire, Seeks to freeze the remembrance of tears it has sobbed, And to smother the anguish of pining desire; The remembrance will live, the remembrance will cling. As the ever-green ivy encircles the oak, And the tempest may strike with its withering wing, But together they bend and together are broke!

Bright star of my soul! thus united we stand, Intermingled in being and blended in breath, Come fate with her darkest, her gloomiest band, We will bend, we will break undivided in death; ’Twas Heaven decreed it, ’twas Heaven that wove The tie which has bound us in home and in heart, And this only we know, we live on but to love, And thus loving we never, oh, never can part!

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MEMORY.

BY LYDIA L. A. VERY.

“’Tis in the morning that the church-yard of Memory gives up its dead.”

Let them rise from the heart’s tomb; Spirits, not of sadness or gloom— White-robed thoughts of Childhood’s truth, Cherished hopes that filled our youth. Let them rise a shining band Coming from the Spirit-Land.

Let them rise! each well-known face, Where so oft we loved to trace Smiles that beamed for us alone, Eyes o’er which Death’s veil is thrown— Let them gather round our bed All unheard their noiseless tread!

Let their eyes of love still speak, Let their breath be on our cheek, And their voice in our ear Murmur words we loved to hear: Let their spirits fair and bright Visit us at morning light.

Death, who cometh thief-like, still Taking Life’s bright gems at will; With us early, with us late, Making hearth-stones desolate— Death, who visits all Life’s bowers. Cannot gather Memory’s flowers!

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THE LAST SONG.

FROM THE GERMAN.

“When will your bards be weary Of rhyming on? How long Ere it is sung and ended, The old, eternal song?

“Is it not, long since, empty, The horn of full supply; And all the posies gathered, And all the fountains dry?”

As long as the sun’s chariot Yet keeps its azure track, And but one human visage Gives answering glances back;

As long as skies shall nourish The thunderbolt and gale, And, frightened at their fury, One throbbing heart shall quail;

As long as after tempests Shall spring one showery bow, One breast with peaceful promise And reconcilement glow;

As long as night the concave Sows with its starry seed, And but one man those letters Of golden writ can read;

Long as a moonbeam glimmers, Or bosom sighs a vow; Long as the wood-leaves rustle To cool a weary brow;

As long as roses blossom, And earth is green in May; As long as eyes shall sparkle, And smile in pleasure’s ray;

As long as cypress shadows The graves more mournful make, Or one cheek’s wet with weeping, Or one poor heart can break;—

So long on earth shall wander The goddess Poesy, And with her, one exulting Her votarist to be.

And singing on, triumphing, The old earth-mansion through, Out marches the last minstrel;— He is the last man too.

The Lord holds the creation Forth in his hand meanwhile, Like a fresh flower just opened, And views it with a smile.

When once this Flower Giant Begins to show decay, And earths and suns are flying Like blossom-dust away.

Then ask,—if of the question Not weary yet,—“How long, Ere it is sung and ended, The old, eternal song?”

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OPTICAL PHENOMENA.

BY THOMAS MILNER, M. A.

It is convenient to place an indefinite title at the head of this article, in order to notice various classes of independent phenomena which immediately address themselves to the eye; and which are either plain developments of electrical action, or simply atmospheric meteors, or appearances resulting from its reflecting and refractive properties, or of obscure origin, but manifested in the atmosphere. To the former class the lightning belongs, beautifully playing among the distant clouds, or flashing with blinding glare and tremendous effect near the surface of the earth, warning man and beast of the presence of an agency able to extinguish animal and vegetable life in a moment, and utterly inappreciable in its swiftness, subtility and power. At the close of a hot, sultry day, over a level country, the igneous meteor often exhibits itself, in rapidly succeeding, broad, noiseless, and imposing sheets of flame, lighting up the whole range of the horizon, revealing for the moment the contour of the distant landscape upon which the shadows of the night have gathered, and discovering the outline of the clouds in the dusky sky. These displays, however startling to “the poor Indian, whose untutored mind” is alarmed at the slightest deviation from the ordinary aspect of things, are always harmless, and invite by their innocuousness and fascination the cultivated races to watch the bounding coruscations of the elastic element, besides contributing to render the fields of corn ripe unto the harvest. But it is otherwise when heat has overcharged the atmosphere with vapors, becoming piled into clouds of gigantic dimensions and massive architecture, which are often propelled by antagonist currents, and in different electrical conditions. After an unusual calm of nature, oppressive to the animal system, during which not a movement of the air is perceptible, and the leaves hang motionless upon the trees, while the brute creation indicate some intelligence of an impending change by their restlessness, an explosion commences. The flash is seen, the thunder heard, and the clouds open their watery store-house, a few distant and heavy drops increasing into a cataract of rain. Flash rapidly follows flash, and the interval between each appearance and the accompanying thunder peal becomes less. The pale hue of the lightning is exchanged for a vivid glare, in which a deep yellow, red, or blue is the predominant color, a variety of aberrations marking its course, the zigzag form showing that the fearful agent is near terrestrial objects. In this manner, “the detraction that wasteth at noonday” is frequently exhibited, now striking man and beast to the earth, or rending asunder the mighty oak of the forest, or firing the vessel of the hapless seaman, or shivering “the cloud-capt towers and gorgeous palaces,” the fanes of religion and the fortresses of war. Man has then a solemn sense of his helplessness and danger; and almost every creature sympathizes with him. The eel is restless in his muddy bed—the horse trembles beneath his rider—the cattle gather lowing to a covert—the eagle nestles in the cleft of the rock with folded wings—the hart looks wild and anxious: only the poor seal seems to experience agreeable sensations, for he will come out of his hiding-place in the deep, at the call of the thunder, and repose upon some overhanging ledge, as if calmly enjoying the convulsion of the elements.

Since the month of June 1752, when Franklin performed the celebrated kite experiment, by which he became the modern Prometheus, bringing down the celestial fire to the earth, the identity of lightning and electricity has been universally known. The theory of the electric fluid, as it is called, is to be sought for in philosophical treatises, our province being to notice its distribution, phenomena, and effects. That subtle principle which the Greeks denominated electricity, from _elektron_, amber, because the property was first noticed in that substance, appears to be a universally diffused agent, its presence having been detected in connection with the clouds, with hail, rain and snow, with vegetation, animals, and the interior strata of the earth. But undue accumulation transpires—the electrical equilibrium is disturbed; and the resulting phenomena of equalization are lightning and thunder. Thus two clouds, or a cloud and the earth, unequally electrified, tend to return to a condition of equality through a conducting medium, a metallic or moist body having the preference as a conductor, the discharge of electricity appearing in the form of a spark or flash, accompanied by a loud detonation according to its violence, the peal rebounding in echoes from cloud to cloud, and from hill to hill. Some regions of the globe are peculiarly subject to accumulations of electricity. Mr. Hamilton, in his work on Asia Minor, observes—“One of the most remarkable phenomena which I observed in Angora, was the great degree of electricity which seemed to pervade every thing. I observed it particularly in silk handkerchiefs, linen and woollen stuffs. At times, when I went to bed in the dark, the sparks which were emitted from the blanket gave it the appearance of a sheet of fire; when I took up a silk handkerchief, the crackling noise would resemble that of breaking a handful of dried leaves or grass; and on one or two occasions I clearly felt my hands and fingers tingle from the electric fluid. I could only attribute it to the extreme dryness of the atmosphere, and momentary friction. I did not observe that it was at all influenced by wind; the phenomena were the same, whether by night or by day, in wind or calm. Not a cloud was visible during the whole of my stay.”

Similar striking indications of the prevalence of electric action have frequently been observed by travelers when near the summits of high mountains, as by Sir W. J. Hooker on Ben Nevis, Saussure on Mont Blanc, and Tupper on Mount Etna. The latter, descending a field of snow, a good conductor, felt a slight shock upon entering a cloud which seemed electric, with a sensation of pain in the back. The hair of his head stood erect, and upon moving the hand near the head, a humming sound proceeded from it, which arose from a succession of sparks. Though a situation of great danger, yet we have several instances of such clouds having been traversed with impunity, when in the act of electrical explosion. The Abbé Richard, in August 1778, passed through a thunder-cloud on the small mountain called Boyer, between Chalons and Tournus. Before he entered the cloud, the thunder sounded, as it is wont to do, with a prolonged reverberation; but when enveloped in it, only single peals were heard, with intervals of silence, without any roll; and after he had passed above the cloud, it reverberated as before, and the lightning flashed. The sister of M. Arago was a party to a similar occurrence between Estagel and Limoux, and some officers of engineers likewise, during a trigonometrical survey on the Pyrenees.

The energy of atmospheric electricity appears to decrease as we recede from the equator to the poles, thus sympathizing with light and heat; for it is in tropical countries that the most terrific flashes of lightning and the loudest bursts of heaven’s artillery occur. Awful as these manifestations are occasionally in our temperate climate, they are but as a skirmishing of outposts to the general engagement of armies, when compared with inter-tropical displays. In Hindustan, in the Indian Ocean, along the African coast off Cape St. Verde, and in Central America, there is often a scene exhibited, which seems a rehearsal of the day “when the heavens being on fire shall pass away with a great noise.” Humboldt, during his residence at Cumana, witnessed a coincident development of electrical action, peculiar atmospheric phenomena, and terrestrial disturbance, during what is called the winter of that region. From the 10th of October to the 3d of November, a reddish vapor rose in the evening, and in a few minutes covered the sky. The hygrometer gave no indication of humidity; the diurnal heat was from 82·4° to 89·6°. The vapor disappeared occasionally in the middle of the night, when brilliantly white clouds formed in the zenith, extending toward the horizon. They were sometimes so transparent that they did not conceal stars even of the fourth magnitude, and the lunar spots were clearly distinguishable through the veil. The clouds were arranged in masses at equal distances, and seemed to be at a prodigious elevation. From the 28th of October to the 3d of November, the fog was thicker than it had been before; and the heat at night was stifling, though the thermometer indicated only 78·8°. There was no evening breeze. The sky appeared as if on fire, and the ground was every where cracked and dusty. About two o’clock in the afternoon of November 4th, large clouds of extraordinary blackness enveloped the mountains of the Brigantine and Tataraqual, extending gradually to the zenith. About four, thunder was heard overhead, but at an immense height, and with a dull and often interrupted sound. At the moment of the strongest electric explosion, two shocks of an earthquake, separated by an interval of fifteen seconds, were felt. The people in the streets filled the air with their cries. Boupland, who was examining plants, was nearly thrown upon the floor, and Humboldt, who was lying in his hammock, felt the concussion strongly. A few minutes before the first, there was a violent gust of wind followed by large drops of rain. The sky remained cloudy, and the blast was succeeded by a dead calm, which continued all night. The sunset was a scene of great magnificence. The dark atmospheric shroud was rent asunder close to the horizon, and the sun appeared at 12° of altitude on an indigo ground, his disc enormously enlarged and distorted. The clouds were gilded on the edges, and bundles of rays reflecting the most brilliant prismatic colors extended over the heavens. About nine in the evening there was a third shock, which, though much slighter, was evidently attended with a subterranean noise. In the night between the 3d and 4th of November, the red vapor before mentioned had been so thick, that the place of the moon could only be distinguished by a beautiful halo 20° in diameter. The vapor ceased to appear on the 7th; the atmosphere then assumed its former purity; and the night of the 11th was cool and extremely lovely. This account, with similar details from other observers, seems to indicate a more intimate relation than is generally admitted between the interior of the earth and its external atmosphere.

Among the regions peculiarly subject to electric phenomena is the country around the estuary of the Rio Plata. In the year 1793, one of the most destructive thunder-storms perhaps on record, happened at Buenos Ayres, when thirty-seven places in the city were struck by the lightning, and nineteen of the inhabitants killed. It is an observation of Mr. Darwin, founded on statements in books of travels, that thunder-storms are very common near the mouths of great rivers; and he conjectures that this may arise from the mixture of large bodies of fresh and salt water disturbing the electrical equilibrium. “Even,” he remarks, “during our occasional visit to this part of South America, we heard of a ship, two churches and a house, having been struck. Both the church and the house I saw shortly afterward. Some of the effects were curious: the paper, for nearly a foot on each side of the line where the bell-wires had run, was blackened. The metal had been fused, and although the room was about fifteen feet high, the globules, dropping on the chairs and furniture, had drilled in them a chain of minute holes. A part of the wall was shattered as if by gunpowder, and the fragments had been blown off with force sufficient to indent the wall on the opposite side of the room. The frame of a looking-glass was blackened; the gilding must have been volatilized, for a smelling-bottle, which stood on the chimney-piece, was coated with bright metallic particles, which adhered as firmly as if they had been enameled.” Near the shores of the Rio Plata, in a broad band of sand hillocks, he found those singular specimens of electric architecture, a group of vitrified siliceous tubes, formed by the lightning striking into loose sand. These tubes had a glossy surface, and were about two inches in circumference, the thickness of the wall of each tube varying from the twentieth to the thirtieth part of an inch. Four sets were noticed, probably not produced by successive distinct charges, but by the lightning dividing itself into separate branches before entering the ground. Similar cylindrical formations have been noticed in other places. Dr. Priestley has described, in the Philosophical Transactions, some siliceous tubes, which were found in digging into the ground, under a tree, where a man had been killed by lightning; and at Drigg, in Cumberland, three were observed within an area of fifteen yards, one of which was traced to a depth of not less than thirty feet. In the temperate climates electrical phenomena are most common, and usually most energetic in the summer season, and the displays are grander and more formidable in mountainous than in level countries. As we approach the poles, they become less striking; thunder is rarely heard in high northern latitudes, and only as a feeble detonation; and though lightning is more common, it is seldom destructive. In Iceland, in the winter, it often plays in the impressive but harmless manner which the natives call laptelltur. This is a fluctuating appearance of the whole sky, as if on fire, accompanied by a strong wind and drifting snow, but inflicting no further damage than that arising from the terrified cattle falling over the rocks in their efforts to escape from the phenomenon.