bird's wing; he undertook to imitate it. Rudely enough he counterfeited its inimitable mechanism. We saw with terror from a column of a hundred feet high a poor human bird armed with wings dart into air, wrestle with it, and dash headlong into atoms. The gloomy and fatal machine in its laborious complexity was a sorry imitation of that admirable arm (far superior to the human arm), that system of muscles which co-operate among themselves in so vigorous and lively a movement. Disjointed and relaxed, the human wing lacked especially that all-powerful muscle which connects the shoulders to the chest, and communicates its impetus to the thunderous flight of the falcon. The instrument acts so directly on the mover, the oar on the rower, and unites with him so perfectly, that the martinet, the frigate-bird, sweeps along at the rate of eighty leagues an hour-five or six times swifter than our most rapid railway trains, outstripping the hurricane, and with no rival but the lightning. But even if our poor imitators had exactly imitated the wing, nothing would have been accomplished. They then had copied the form, but not the internal structure. They thought that the bird's power of ascension lay in its flight alone, forgetting the secret auxiliary which nature conceals in the plumage and bones. The mystery, the true marvel, lies in the faculty with which she endows the bird of rendering itself light or heavy at its will, of admitting more or less of air into its expressly constructed reservoirs. Would it grow light, it inflates its dimensions while diminishing its relative weight. By this means it spontaneously ascends in a medium heavier than itself. To descend or drop it contracts itself, grows thin and small, cutting through the air which supported and raised it in its former heavy condition. Here lay the error, the cause of man's fatal mistake. He assumed that the bird was a ship, not a balloon. He imitated the wing only; but the wing, however skillfully imitated, if not conjoined with this internal force, is but a certain means of destruction. But this faculty, this rapid inhalation or expulsion of air, of swimming with a ballast variable at pleasure, whence does it proceed? From a unique, unheardof power of respiration. The man who should inhale a similar quantity of air at once would be suffocated. The bird's lung, elastic and powerful, quaffs it abundantly into his bones, into his aërial cells. Each inspiration is renewed second after second with tremendous rapidity. The blood, ceaselessly vivified with fresh air, supplies each muscle with that inexhaustible energy which no other being possesses, and which belongs only to the elements. The bird does not need to seek the air that he may be reinvigorated by touching it; the air seeks and flows into him. It incessantly kindles within him the burning fires of life. It is this and not the wing which is so marvelous. Take the pinions of the condor, and follow in its track when from the summit of the Andes and their Siberian glaciers it swoops down upon the glowing shore of Peru, traversing in a minute all the temperatures and all the climates of the globe, breathing at one breath the frightful mass of air-scorched, frozen, it matters not. You would reach the earth stricken as by lightning. The smallest bird in this matter shames the strongest quadruped. Place, says Toussenel, a chained lion in a balloon and his harsh voice will be lost in space. Far more powerful in voice and respiration the little lark mounts upward, trilling its song, and makes itself heard when it can be seen no longer. Its light and joyous strain, uttered without fatigue and costing nothing, seems the bliss of an invisible spirit which would fain console the earth. Strength makes joy. The happiest of beings is the bird, because it feels itself strong beyond the limits of its action, because cradled, sustained by the breath of heaven, it floats, it rises without effort like-a dream. The boundless strength, the exalted faculty-obscure among inferior beings, in the bird clear and vital-of deriving at will its vigor from the maternal source, of drinking life in at full flood, is a divine intoxication. The tendency of every human being-a tendency not arrogant, not impious-is to liken itself to nature, the great mother; to fashion itself after her image; to crave a share of the unwearied wings with which Eternal Love broods over the world. Human tradition is fixed in this direction. Man does not wish to be a man, but an angel, a winged deity. The winged genii of Persia suggests the cherubims of Judea. Greece endows her Psyche with wings, and discovers the true name of the soul-aspiration. The soul has preserved her pinions; has passed at one flight through the shadowy middle age, and constantly increases in heavenly longings. More spotless and more glowing, she gives utterance to a prayer breathed in the very depths of the prophetic ardor: "Oh, that I were a bird!" Woman never doubts but her offspring will become an angel. She has seen it so in her dreams. Dreams or realities? Winged visions, raptures of the night which we shall weep so bitterly in the morning! If you really were! If indeed you lived! If we had lost some of the causes of our regret! If from stars to stars, reunited and launched on an eternal flight, we all performed in companionship a happy pilgrimage through the illimitable goodness! At times one is apt to believe it. Something whispers us that these dreams are not all dreams, but glimpses of a world of truth-momentary flashes revealing through these lower clouds certain promises to be hereafter fulfilledwhile the pretended reality it is that should be stigmatized as a foul delusion. XXII.-THE THUNDER-STORM. GEORGE D. PRENTICE. I never was a man of feeble courage. There are few scenes of either human or elemental strife upon which I have not looked with a brow of daring. I have stood in front of the battle when the swords were gleaming and circling around me like fiery serpents in the air. I have seen these things with a swelling soul that knew not, that recked not of danger. But there is something in the thunder's voice that makes me tremble like a child. I have tried to overcome this unmanly weakness. I have called pride to my aid; I have sought for moral courage in the lessons of philosophy; but the effort availed me nothing. At the first low moaning of the distant cloud my heart shrinks and dies within me. My involuntary dread of thunder had its origin in an incident that occurred when I was a boy of ten years. I had a little cousin-a girl of the same age with myself who had been a constant companion of my youth. Strange that after the lapse of many years that occurrence should be so familiar to me. I can see the bright young creature, her eyes flashing like beautiful gems, her free locks streaming as in joy upon the rising gale, and her cheeks glowing like rubies through a wreath of transparent snow. Her voice had the melody and joyousness of a bird's; and when she bounded over the wooded hill or fresh green valley, shouting a glad answer to every voice of nature, and clapping her little hands in the ecstasy of young existence, she looked as if breaking away, like a free nightingale, from the earth, and going off where all things are beautiful like her. It was a morning in the middle of August. The little girl had been passing some days at my father's house, and she was now to return home. Her path lay across the fields, and gladly I became the companion of her walk. I never knew a summer morning more beautiful and still. Only one little cloud was visible, and that seemed as pure and white and peaceful as if it had been the incense-smoke of some burning censer of the skies. The leaves hung silent in the woods, the waters in the bay had forgotten their undulations, the flowers were bending their heads as if dreaming of rainbow and dew, and the whole atmosphere was of such a soft and luxurious sweetness that it seemed a cloud of roses scattered down by the hands of Peri from the far-off garden of Paradise. The green earth and the blue sea lay around in their boundlessness, and the peaceful sky bent over and blessed them. The little creature at my side was in a delirium of happiness, and her clear sweet voice came ringing upon the air as often as she heard the tones of a favorite bird or found some strange and lovely flower in her frolic wanderings. The unbroken and almost supernatural stillness of the day continued until noon; then for the first time the indications of an approaching storm became manifest. On the summit of a mountain, at the distance of about a mile, the folds of a dark cloud became suddenly visible, and at the same instant a hollow roar came down upon the winds, as if it had been the sound of waves in a rocky cavern. The clouds rolled out like a banner unfolded upon the air, but still the atmosphere was as calm, the leaves as motionless as before, and there was not even a quiver among the sleeping waters to tell of the coming hurricane. To escape the tempest was impossible. As the only resort we fled to an oak that stood at the foot of a tall and rugged precipice. Here we stood and gazed almost breathlessly upon the clouds marshaling themselves like bloody giants in the sky. The thunder was not frequent, but every burst was so fearful that the young creature who stood by me shut her eyes convulsively, and clung with desperate strength to my arms, and shrieked as if her heart would break. A few minutes and the storm was upon us. During the height of its fury the little girl lifted her finger toward the precipice that towered over us. I looked and saw there a purple light; and instantly the clouds opened, the rocks tottered to their foundations, a roar like the groan of the universe filled the air, and I felt myself blinded and thrown I know not whither. How long I remained insensible I can not tell, but when consciousness returned the violence of the tempest was abating, the roar of the winds was dying in the tree-tops, and the deep tones of the thunder-clouds came in faint murmurs from the eastern hills. I arose and looked tremblingly and almost deliriously around. She was there, the dear idol of my infant love, stretched out upon the green earth. After a moment of irresolution I went up and looked upon her. The handkerchief upon her neck was slightly rent, and a single dark spot upon her bosom told where the pathway of death had been. At first I clasped her to my breast with a cry of agony, and then laid her down and gazed upon her face with feelings almost of calmness. Her bright disheveled hair clustered sweetly around her brow; the look of terror had faded from her lips and infant smiles were pictured there; the rose-tinge upon her cheeks was as lovely as in life, and as I pressed them upon my own the fountain of tears was opened, and I wept as if my heart were waters. I have but a dim recollection of what followed; I only know that I remained weeping and motionless till the coming twilight, and I was taken tenderly by the hand and led away where I saw the countenances of parents and sisters. Many years have gone by on the wings of light and shadow, but the scenes I have portrayed still come over me at times with a terrible distinctness. The oak yet stands at the base of the precipice, but its limbs are black and dead, and the hollow trunk, looking up to the sky as if "calling to the clouds for drink," is an emblem of rapid and noiseless decay. A year ago I visited the spot, and the thought of by-gone years came mournfully back to me. I thought of the little innocent being who fell at my side, like some beautiful tree of spring rent up by the whirlwind in the midst of blossoming. But I remembered—and oh, there was joy in the memory— that she had gone where the lightnings slumber in the folds of the rainbowcloud, and where the sunlight waters are broken only by the storm-breath of Omnipotence. The following selections from Shakespeare and other poets are marked for emphasis and rhetorical pauses. XXIII.-CARDINAL WOLSEY'S SOLILOQUY. SHAKESPEARE. Wolsey. Nay, then, farewell! I have touched-the highest point-of all my greatness: I haste-(now) to my setting. I-shall fall- And no man-see me-more! Farewell, a long farewell,-to all-my greatness! This is the state-of man: To-day-he puts forth- And-when he thinks,-(good-easy man,) full surely— Is that-poor man-th't hangs-on princes'-favors! Never to hope-again! [Enter Cromwell, amazedly. Why, how now,-Cromwell? Cromwell. I have no power-to speak, sir. Wol. What! amaz'd-at my misfortunes? can thy spirit-wonderA great man-should decline? Nay, an' you-weep, I am-fallen-indeed! Crom. How does your grace? Why,-well; Never-so truly happy,-my good Cromwell. I know myself-now: and I feel—(within me)— A peace-above all-earthly dignities, A still-and quiet conscience. The king has cured me, I humbly—thank his grace, and—from these shoulders, (These ruined pillars,) out of pity, taken A load-would sink-a navy,-too much honor: Oh, 't is a burden,—(Cromwell,) 't is a burden— Too heavy-for a man-t Crom. I am glad your grace—has made that right use of it. (Out of a fortitude of soul I feel,) To endure more miseries,-and greater-far, Than my weak-hearted enemies-dare offer. Crom. The next is-that Sir Thomas More-is chosen Lord chancellor-in your place. Wol. That's-somewhat-sudden; But—he's a learned man. May he continue— Crom. That Cranmer—is returned-with welcome, Wol. That's-news-indeed! Crom. Last,-th't the lady Anne, (Whom the king-hath-in secrecy—long married,) This day-was viewed-(in open,) as his queen,— Wol. There was the weight—th't pulled me down. O Cromwell! |