A THANKSGIVING SERMON.

MY FRIENDS, Thanksgiving Day comes, by statute, once a year; to the honest man it comes as frequently as the heart of gratitude will allow, which may mean every day, or once in seven days, at least. I know that occa

sionally, in meeting, perhaps, a person confesses that he is a poor, miserable sinner, but you tell that person the same fact, out of doors, and he will get mad and tear round dreadfully. We are all honest, good, conscientious people, my friends, no matter what any body says.

Now, I propose, my friends, to state a few of the things for us to be thankful for-when we are in the mood, of course; for when we are not inclined, who can make us give thanks for any thing? We should be thankful that we know more than any body else; for, are we not capable of talking and giving lectures upon every subject ever talked of? I should like to see the male or female in this audience, who didn't know a great deal more than any body has any idea of!

We should be thankful that we are all good looking. Ain't we? Just look around this audience, and see if you can "spot" the person who is, in his own estimation, not good looking. It would be a curious study to be sure, to find in what particular some people are good looking; but it's none of our personal business if a man has carroty hair, eyes like a new moon, nose like a split pear, mouth like a pair of waffle-irons, chin like a Dutch churn, neck like a gander's, and a body like a crow-bar :-comparatively he is good-looking; that is, there are homelier men and animals than he; so everybody is good looking and has a right to put on airs. Let us be very thankful, my friends, that this is so; for, otherwise, some of us would be shut up in "homes for the scare crows," which government would have to provide.

We should be thankful that we are more pious than any body else. That we are pious is evident from the manner in which we treat poor creatures who have most unfortunately been driven to sin; from the fact that we pay our preachers occasionally, and always require them

to be unexceptionable, in all respects; from the fact that we don't work on Sunday, and eat the big dinners which it has made the women-folks almost tired to death to prepare. Who is the person in this room that is not pious? I do not care to know him for the present.

We should give thanks that our house is, in many respects, superior to our neighbors. True it may not be as big, nor as fine-looking, nor, indeed, as attractive generally; but it is superior, nevertheless, as we always inform any man who wants to purchase:-we should be very thankful that we can turn things so favorably for our own interests.

We should be thankful that our teachers, and our editors, and doctors, and lawyers, are such superior men, as we learn they are, when they come to die and have their epitaphs written.

We should be thankful, in fact, that this world was especially created for our own comfort, convenience, and use; that we have a perfect right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,-no matter if these do conflict with some other persons' wishes, and happiness, and rights.

I hope you will thank me for this recognition of your good qualities, your rights, your glory; and trust I shall be permitted to say of myself, when I retire,

"Here lies an honest young man.”

Le Grand.

ONLY WAITING.

A very aged Christian who was so poor as to be in an alms-house, was asked what he was doing now. He replied," Only waiting."

Only waiting till the shadows
Are a little longer grown;
Only waiting till the glimmer

Of the day's last beam is flown;
Till the night of earth is faded

From the heart once full of day;
Till the stars of heaven are breaking
Through the twilight soft and gray.

Only waiting till the reapers

Have the last sheaf gathered home;
For the summer time is faded,

And the autumn winds have come.
Quickly, reapers, gather quickly
The last ripe hours of my heart,
For the bloom of life is withered,
And I hasten to depart.

Only waiting till the angels
Open wide the mystic gate,
At whose feet I long have lingered,
Weary, poor, and desolate.
Even now I hear the footsteps,
And their voices, far away;
If they call me, I am waiting,
Only waiting toʻobey.

Only waiting till the shadows
Are a little longer grown;
Only waiting till the glimmer

Of the day's last beam is flown;
Then from out the gathered darkness,
Holy, deathless stars shall rise,
By whose light my soul shall gladly
Tread its pathway to the skies.

NOTHING TO WEAR.

MISS Flora McFlimsey, of Madison Square,
Has made three separate journeys to Paris;
And her father assures me, each time she was there,
That she and her friend, Mrs. Harris,

Spent six consecutive weeks, without stopping,
In one continuous round of shopping;
Shopping alone and shopping together,

At all hours of the day, and in all sorts of weather,
For all manner of things that a woman can put
On the crown of her head, or the sole of her foot,
Or wrap round her shoulders, or fit round her waist,
Or that can be sewed on, or pinned on, or laced,
Or tied on with a string, or stitched on with a bow,
In front or behind, above or below;

Dresses for home, and the street, and the hall,
Dresses for winter, spring, summer, and fall;—

And yet, though scarce three months have passed since

the day

All this merchandise went in twelve carts up Broadway,
This same Miss McFlimsey, of Madison Square,
When asked to a ball was in utter despair,
Because she had nothing whatever to wear!
But the fair Flora's case is by no means surprising;
I find there exists the greatest distress
In our female community, solely arising

From this unsupplied destitution of dress;
Whose unfortunate victims are filling the air
With the pitiful wail of "Nothing to wear!"

Oh ladies, dear ladies, the next sunny day
Please trundle your hoops just out of Broadway,
To the alleys and lanes where misfortune and guilt
Their children have gathered, their hovels have built;
Where hunger and vice, like twin beasts of prey

Have hunted their victims to gloom and despair;
Raise the rich, dainty dress, and the fine broidered skirt,
Pick your delicate way through the dampness and dirt,
Grope through the dark dens, climb the rickety stair
To the garret, where wretches, the young and the old,
Half starved and half naked, lie crouched from the cold;
See those skeleton limbs, those frost-bitten feet,
All bleeding and bruised by the stones of the street,
Then home to your wardrobes, and say, if you dare,—
Spoiled children of fashion,-you've nothing to wear!

And, oh, if perchance there should be a sphere,
Where all is made right which so puzzles us here;
Where the glare, and the glitter, and tinsel of time
Fade and die in the light of that region sublime;
Where the soul, disenchanted of flesh and of sense,
Unscreened by its trappings, and shows, and pretence,
Must be clothed for the life and the service above,
With purity, truth, faith, meekness, and love;
Oh, daughters of earth! foolish virgins, beware!
Lest, in that upper realm,-you have nothing to wear!
Wm. Allen Butler.

IRISH ALIENS.

In reply to Lord Lyndhurst (1837), who had stigmatized the Irish as aliens.

THERE is a man of great abilities-not a member of this house, but whose talents and boldness have placed

him in the topmost place in his party-who has been heard to speak of the Irish as "aliens." Disdaining all imposture, and abandoning all reserve, he distinctly and audaciously tells the Irish people that they are not entitled to the same privileges as Englishmen; that they are "aliens." Aliens? Good heavens! Was Arthur, Duke of Wellington, in the House of Lords, and did he not start up and exclaim, "Hold! I have seen the aliens do their duty!" The "battles, sieges, fortunes that he has passed," ought to have come back upon him. He ought to have remembered that, from the earliest acheivement in which he displayed that military genius which has placed him foremost in the annals of modern warfare, down to that last and surpassing combat, which has made his name imperishable, from Assaye to Waterloo,-the Irish sol diers, with whom your armies are filled, were the inseparable auxiliaries to the glory with which his unparalleled successes have been crowned.

.

Whose were the arms that drove your bayonets at Vimiera through the phalanxes that never reeled in the shock of war before? What desperate valor climbed the steeps and filled the moats of Badajos? All, all his victories should have rushed and crowded back upon his memory; Vimiera, Badajos, Salamanca, Albuera, Toulouse; and, last of all, the greatestTell me, for you

were there, I appeal to the gallant soldier before me (Sir Henry Hardinge), who bears, I know, a generous heart in an intrepid breast;-tell me, for you must needs remember,-on that day, when the destinies of mankind were trembling in the balance, while death fell in showers; when the artillery of France, leveled with the precision of the most deadly science, played upon them; when her legions, incited by the voice, inspired by the example, of their mighty leader, rushed again and again to the onset, —tell me if, for an instant, when to hesitate for an instant was to be lost, the "aliens" blenched! And when, at length, the moment for the last decisive movement had arrived; when the valor, so long wisely checked, was at last let loose; when with words familiar, but immortal, the great captain commanded the great assault,-tell me if Catholic Ireland with less heroic valor than the natives of your own glorious isle precipitated herself upon the foe!