softer and more luxuriant vegetation. Lofty natural mounds rose amidst the rest, with the same lovely and sweeping outline, showing every where the plastic power of water,-water, mother of beauty, which, by its sweet and eager flow, had left such lineaments as human genius never dreamt of.

Not far from the river was a high crag, called the Pine Rock, which looks out, as our guide observed, like a helmet above the brow of the country. It seems as if the water left here and there a vestige of forms and materials that preceded its course, just to set off its new and richer designs.

The aspect of this country was to me enchanting, beyond any I have ever seen, from its fulness of expression, its bold and impassioned sweetness. Here the flood of emotion has passed over and marked everywhere its course by a smile. The fragments of rock touch it with a wildness and liberality which give just the needed relief. I should never be tired here, though I have elsewhere seen country of more secret and alluring charms, better calculated to stimulate and suggest. the eye and heart are filled.

Here

How happy the Indians must have been here! It is not long since they were driven away, and the ground, above and below, is full of their traces.

"The earth is full of men."

You have only to turn up the sod to find arrowheads and Indian pottery. On an island, belonging to our host, and nearly opposite his house, they loved to stay, and no doubt, enjoyed its lavish beauty as much as the myriad wild pigeons that now haunt its flower-filled shades. Here are still the marks of their tomahawks, the troughs in which they prepared their corn, their caches.

A little way down the river is the site of an ancient Indian village, with its regularly arranged mounds. As usual, they had chosen with the finest taste. When we went there, it was one of those soft, shadowy afternoons when Nature seems ready to weep, not from grief, but from an overfull heart. Two prattling, lovely little girls, and an African boy, with glittering eye and ready grin, made our party gay; but all were still as we entered the little inlet and trod those flowery paths. They may blacken Indian life as they will, talk of its dirt, its brutality, I will ever believe that the men who chose that dwellingplace were able to feel emotions of noble happiness as they returned to it, and so were the women that received them.

Neither were the children sad or dull, who lived so familiarly with the deer and the birds, and swam that clear wave in the shadow of the Seven Sisters. The whole scene suggested to me a Greek splendor, a Greek sweetness, and I can believe that an Indian brave, accustomed to ramble in such paths, and be bathed by such sunbeams, might be mistaken for Apollo, as Apollo was for him by West. Two of the boldest bluffs are called the Deer's Walk, (not because deer do not walk there), and the Eagle's nest. The latter I visited one glorious morning; it was that of the fourth of July, and certainly I think I had never felt so happy that I was born in America. Woe to all country folks that never saw this spot, never swept an enraptured gaze over the prospect that stretched beneath. I do believe Rome and Florence are suburbs compared to this capital of Nature's art.

The bluff was decked with great bunches of a scarlet variety of the milkweed, like cut coral, and all starred with a mysterious-looking dark flower, whose cup rose lonely on a tall stem. This had, for two or three days, disputed the ground with the lupine and phlox. My companions disliked, I liked it.

HELLVELLYN.-SIR WALTer Scott.

I climb'd the dark brow of the mighty Hellvellyn,
Lakes and mountains beneath me gleam'd misty and wide;
All was still, save by fits when the eagle was yelling,

And starting around me the echoes replied.

On the right, Striden-edge round the Red-tarn was bending,
And Catchedicam its left verge was defending,

One huge nameless rock in the front was ascending,

When I mark'd the sad spot where the wanderer had died.

Dark green was the spot mid the brown meadow heather,
Where the pilgrim of nature lay stretch'd in decay,-
Like the course of an outcast abandon'd to weather,
Till the mountain-winds wasted the tenantless clay.
Nor yet quite deserted, though lonely extended,
For faithful in death, his mute favorite attended,
The much-loved remains of her master defended,
And chased the hill-fox and the raven away.

How long didst thou think that his silence was slumber?
When the wind waved his garment how oft didst thou start?
How many long days and long weeks didst thou number,
Ere he faded before thee, the friend of thy heart?

And, oh! was it meet, that—no requiem read o'er him,
No mother to weep, and no friend to deplore him,
And thou, little guardian, alone stretch'd before him—
Unhonor'd the pilgrim from life should depart?

When a prince to the fate of the peasant has yielded,
The tapestry waves dark round the dim-lighted hall;
With scutcheons of silver the coffin is shielded,

And pages stand mute by the canopied pall:

Through the courts, at deep midnight, the torches are gleaning,
In the proudly-arch'd chapel the banners are beaming,
Far adown the long aisle sacred music is streaming,
Lamenting a chief of the people should fall.

But meeter for thee, gentle lover of nature,

To lay down thy head like the meek mountain lamb;
When, wilder'd he drops from some cliff huge in stature,
And draws his last sob by the side of his dam.
And more stately thy couch by this desert lake lying,
Thy obsequies sung by the gray plover flying,
With one faithful friend to witness thy dying
In the arms of Hellvellyn and Catchedicam.

THE RAVEN.-EDGAR A. POE.

Once upon a midnight dreary,
While I ponder'd, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious
Volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping,
Suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping,

Rapping at my chamber door.
""Tis some visiter," I mutter'd,
"Tapping at my chamber door-
Only this, and nothing more."

Ah, distinctly I remember,
It was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember
Wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wish'd the morrow;
Vainly I had tried to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow-
Sorrow for the lost Lenore-
For the rare and radiant maiden
Whom the angels name Lenore-
Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken, sad, uncertain
Rustling of each purple curtain
Thrill'd me-fill'd me with fantastio
Terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating
Of my heart, I stood repeating
""Tis some visiter entreating
Entrance at my chamber door-
Some late visiter entreating

Entrance at my chamber door;
This it is, and nothing more."

Presently my soul grew stronger;
Hesitating then no longer,
"Sir," said I, "or Madam, truly
Your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is, I was napping,
And so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping,
Tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you,"
Here I open'd wide the door:
Darkness there, and nothing more!

Deep into that darkness peering,
Long I stood there, wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal
Ever dared to dream before:
But the silence was unbroken,
And the darkness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken
Was the whisper'd word, "Lenore !"
This I whisper'd, and an echo

Murmur'd back the word "Lenore!"
Merely this, and nothing more.

Then into the chamber turning,
All my soul within me burning,
Soon I heard again a tapping

Somewhat louder than before.
"Surely," said I, "surely that is
Something at my window lattice;
Let me see, then, what thereat is,
And this mystery explore-
Let my heart be still a moment,
And this mystery explore;
'Tis the wind, and nothing more!"

Open here I flung the shutter,
When, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepp'd a stately raven

Of the saintly days of yore;

Not the least obeisance made he;
Not an instant stopp'd or stay'd he;
But, with mien of lord or lady,
Perch'd above my chamber door-
Perch'd upon a bust of Pallas

Just above my chamber door-
Perch'd, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling
My sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum

Of the countenance it wore,
"Though thy crest be shorn and shaven.
Thou," I said, "art sure no craven,
Ghastly grim and ancient raven,
Wandering from the Nightly store-
Tell me what thy lordly name is
On the Night's Plutonian shore!"
Quoth the raven "Nevermore."

Much I marvell'd this ungainly
Fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning-
Little relevancy bore;

For we cannot help agreeing
That no living human being
Ever yet was bless'd with seeing

Bird above his chamber door-
Bird or beast upon the sculptured
Bust above his chamber door,
With such name as "Nevermore."

But the raven sitting lonely
On the placid bust, spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in

That one word he did outpour.
Nothing farther then he utter'd-
Not a feather then he flutter'd-
Till I scarcely more than mutter'd
"Other friends have flown before-
On the morrow he will leave me,

As my hopes have flown before."
Then the bird said "Nevermore."

Startled at the stillness broken
By reply so aptly spoken,
"Doubtless," said I, "what it utters

Is its only stock and store
Caught from some unhappy master
Whom unmerciful Disaster

Follow'd fast and follow'd faster

Til his songs one burden bore