And what is so rare as a day in June?
Then, if ever, come perfect days,

Then Heaven tries the earth if it be in tune,

And over it softly her warm ear lays:

Whether we look or whether we listen,

We hear life murmur, or see it glisten;

Every clod feels a stir of might,

An instinct within it that reaches and towers,

And, groping blindly above it for light,

Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers.

- LOWELL.

June. Rest! This is the year's bower. Sit down within it. The winds bring perfume, the forests sing to thee, the earth shows thee all her treasures. The air is all sweetness. The storms are but as flocks of mighty birds that spread their wings and sing in the high heaven. The earth cries to the heavens, "God is here!" The heavens cry to the earth, "God is here!" The land claims him, and his footsteps are upon the sea. O sunny joys of sunny June, how soon will you be scorched by the eager months coming burning from the equator!

THE SOUTH DURING THE REVOLUTION

What, Sir, was the conduct of the South during the Revolution? Sir, I honor New England for her conduct in that glorious struggle. But, great as is the praise which belongs to her, I think at least equal honor is due the South. They espoused the quarrel of their brethren, with a generous zeal, which did not suffer them to stop to calculate their interest in the dispute. Favorites of the mother country, possessed of neither ships nor seamen to create a commercial rivalship, they might have found in their situation a guarantee that their trade would be forever fostered and protected by Great Britain. But, trampling on all considerations either of interest or of safety, they rushed into the conflict, and, fighting for principle, perilled all in the sacred cause of freedom. Never were there exhibited, in the history of the world, higher examples of noble daring, dreadful suffering, and heroic endurance than by the Whigs of Carolina during the Revolution. The whole State, from the mountains to the sea, was overrun by an overwhelming force of the enemy. The fruits of industry perished on the spot where they were produced, or

were consumed by the foe. The "plains of Carolina" drank up the most precious blood of her citizens. Black and smoking ruins marked the places which had been the habitations of her children! Driven from their homes into the gloomy and almost impenetrable swamps, even there the spirit of liberty survived; and South Carolina, sustained by the example of her Sumters and her Marions, proved, by her conduct, that though her soil might be overrun, the spirit of her people was invincible.

HAYNE.

HYMN TO MONT BLANC

Hast thou a charm to stay the morning-star In his steep course? So long he seems to pause

On thy bald, awful head, O sovereign

Blanc!

The Arve and Arveiron at thy base
Rave carelessly; but thou, most

awful form,

Risest from forth thy silent sea of pines,

How silently! Around thee and above,

Deep in the air and dark, substantial black,

An ebon mass: methinks thou piercest it

As with a wedge! But, when I look

again,

It is thine own calm home, thy crystal shrine,
Thy habitation from eternity.

O dread and silent Mount! I gazed upon thee
Till thou, still present to the bodily sense,

Didst vanish from my thought: entranced in prayer,
I worship'd the Invisible alone.

Yet, like some sweet, beguiling melody,

So sweet we know not we are listening to it,

Thou, the meanwhile, wast blending with my thought,
Yea, with
my life and life's own secret joy;
Till the dilating soul-enrapt, transfused,
Into the mighty vision passing—there,
As in her natural form, swell'd vast to Heaven!

Awake, my soul! not only passive praise
Thou owest; not alone these swelling tears,
Mute thanks, and secret ecstasy. Awake,
Voice of sweet song! Awake, my heart, awake!
Green vales and icy cliffs, all join my hymn.

Thou first and chief, sole sovereign of the vale!
O, struggling with the darkness all the night,
And visited all night by troops of stars,

Or when they climb the sky or when they sink;
Companion of the morning-star at dawn,
Thyself Earth's rosy star, and of the dawn
Co-herald; wake, Oh, wake, and utter praise!
Who sank thy sunless pillars deep in earth?
Who fill'd thy countenance with rosy light?
Who made thee parent of perpetual streams?