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before they suspected they had changed their place. The placid serenity, which at first appeared in their countenance, changed by degrees into a melancholy langor, which was tinged with deeper and deeper gloom, as they glided down the stream of insignificance; a dark and sluggish water, which is curled by no breeze, and enlivened by no murmur, till it falls into a dead sea, where startled passengers are awakened by the shock, and the next moment buried in the gulf of Oblivion.

Of all the unhappy deserters from the paths of science, none seemed less able to return than the followers of indolence. The captives of appetite and passion would often seize the moment when their tyrants were languid or asleep, to escape from their enchantment; but the dominion of indolence was constant and unremitted; and seldom resisted, till resistance was in vain.

But

After contemplating these things, I turned my eyes towards the top of the mountain, where the air was always pure and exhilarating, the path shaded with laurels and evergreens, and the effulgence which beamed from the face of science seemed to shed a glory round her votaries. Happy, said I are they who are permitted to ascend the mountain! while, with uncommon ardor, I was pronouncing this exclamation, I saw standing beside me, a form of diviner features, and a more benign radiance. 'Happier,' said she, 'are they whom Virtue conducts to the Mansions of Content.' 'What,' said I, 'does Virtue then reside in the vale?' 'I am found,' said she, 'in the vale, and I illuminate the mountain. I cheer the cottager at his toil, and inspire the sage at his meditation. I mingle in the crowd of cities, and bless the hermit in his cell. I have a temple in every heart that owns my influence; and to him that wishes for me, I am already present. Science may raise thee to eminence; but I alone can guide thee to felicity! While Virtue was thus speaking, I stretched out my arms towards her, with a vehemence which broke my slumber. The chill dews were falling around me, and the shades of evening stretched over the landscape. I hastened homeward; and resigned the night to silence and meditation.

THE NOTES OF THE BIRDS.

WELL do I love those various harmonies
That ring so gayly in Spring's budding woods,
And in the thickets, and green, quiet haunts,
And lonely copses of the Summer-time,
And in red Autumn's ancient solitudes.

If thou art pained with the world's noisy stir,
Or crazed with its mad tumults, and weighed down
With any of the ills of human life;

If thou art sick and weak, or mournest at the loss
Of brethren gone to that far distant land
To which we all do pass, gentle and poor,
The gayest and the gravest, all alike,—
Then turn into the peaceful woods, and hear
The thrilling music of the forest birds.

How rich the varied choir. The unquiet finch
Calls from the distant hollows, and the wren
Uttereth her sweet and mellow plaint at times,
And the thrush mourneth where the kalmia hangs
Its crimson-spotted cups, or chirps half hid
Amid the lowly dogwood's snowy flowers,
And the blue jay flits by, from tree to tree,
And, spreading its rich pinions, fills the ear
With its shrill-sounding and unsteady cry.

With the sweet airs of Spring, the robin comes,
And in her simple song there seems to gush
A strain of sorrow when she visiteth
Her last year's withered nest. But when the gloom
Of the deep twilight falls, she takes her perch
Upon the red-stemmed hazel's slender twig,
That overhangs the brook, and suits her song
To the slow rivulet's inconstant chime.

In the last days of Autumn, when the corn
Lies sweet and yellow in the harvest-field,
And the gay company of reapers bind

The bearded wheat in sheaves,-then peals abroad
The blackbird's merry chant. I love to hear,
Bold plunderer, thy mellow burst of song
Float from thy watch place on the mossy tree
Close at the corn-field edge.

Lone whippoorwill,

There is much sweetness in thy fitful hymn,
Heard in the drowsy watches of the night.
Oft-times, when all the village lights are out,
And the wide air is still, I hear thee chant
Thy hollow dirge, like some recluse who takes
His lodging in the wilderness of woods,
And lifts his anthem when the world is still:
And the dim, solemn night, that brings to man
And to the herds, deep slumbers, and sweet dews
To the red roses and the herbs, doth find
No eye, save thine, a watcher in her halls.

I hear thee oft at midnight, when the thrush
And the green, roving linnet are at rest,

And the blithe, twittering swallows have long ceased Their noisy note, and folded up their wings.

Far up some brook's still course, whose current mines The forest's blackened roots, and whose green marge Is seldom visited by human foot,

The lonely heron sits, and harshly breaks
The Sabbath silence of the wilderness:
And you may find her by some reedy pool,

Or brooding gloomily on the time-stained rock,
Beside some misty and far-reaching lake.

Most awful is thy deep and heavy boom,
Gray watcher of the waters! Thou art king
Of the blue lake; and all the winged kind
Do fear the echo of thine angry cry.

How bright thy savage eye! Thou lookest down,
And seest the shining fishes as they glide;

And, poising thy gray wing, thy glossy beak
Swift as an arrow strikes its roving prey.
Ofttimes I see thee, through the curling mist,
Dart, like a spectre of the night, and hear
Thy strange, bewildering call, like the wild scream
Of one whose life is perishing in the sea.

And now, wouldst thou, O man, delight the ear
With earth's delicious sounds, or charm the eye
With beautiful creations? Then pass forth,
And find them midst those many colored birds
That fill the glowing woods. The richest hues

Lie in their splendid plumage, and their tones
Are sweeter than the music of the lute,
Or the harp's melody, or the notes that gush
So thrillingly from Beauty's ruby lip.

TO A HUMMING BIRD.

BIRD of the Summer bower!
Whose burnished plumage to the air is given,
How thy bill dips in each luxuriant flower,
How thy wing fleets thro' heaven!

Thou seemest to Fancy's eye

An animated blossom born in air;

Which breathes and bourgeons in the golden sky
And sheds its odours there.

Thou seem'st a rainbow hue
Touched by the sunbeam into life and light;
As cuts thy rosy wing the welkin thro'
In its eternal flight.

Thou art not born of Earth!
Thy home is in the free and pathless air!
The wild flower eglantine bloom'd on thy birth,
And threw its fragrance there.

The green and spangled dell,

For thee diffuses its sweet scent and hue:
Thou drinkest, from the tulips ample bell,
The late and early dew.

I love, sweet bird! to see

Thy crimson plumage in the morning clear.
Thy gambols,-thy capricious revelry
In the thin atmosphere.

How thou art full of life

How art thou joyous thro' thy transient hour— For thee, the morning air with sweets is rifeFor thee blooms the May bower.

Go forth, on thy glad way!

The Eagle of an hundred years, is not
So happy in his towering pride of sway,
As thou, in thy brief lot!

SPRING.

WHILE beauty clothes the fertile vale,
And blossoms on the spray,

And fragrance breathes in ev'ry gale,
How sweet the vernal day!

How kind the influence of the skies!
Soft show'rs, with blessings fraught,
Bid verdure, beauty, fragrance rise,
And fix the roving thought.

O let my wond'ring heart confess,
With gratitude and love,

The bounteous hand that deigns to bless
The garden, field, and grove.

That bounteous hand my thoughts adore,
Beyond expression kind,
Hath sweeter, nobler gifts in store,
To bless the craving mind.

Inspir'd to praise, I then shall join
Glad nature's cheerful song,
And love and gratitude divine
Attune my joyful tongue.

THE VILLAGE GRAVE-YARD.

'Why is my sleep disquieted?

Who is he that calls the dead?'-BYRON.

In the beginning of the fine month of October, I was traveling with a friend in one of our northern states, on a tour of recreation and pleasure. We were tired of the city, its noise, its smoke, and its unmeaning dissipation; and, with the feelings of emancipated prisoners, we had been breathing, for a few weeks, the perfume of the vales, and the elastic atmosphere of the uplands. Some minutes before the sunset of a most lovely day, we entered a neat little village, whose tapering spire we had caught sight of at intervals an hour before, as our road made an unexpected turn, or led us to the top of a hill. Having no motive to urge a farther progress, and being unwilling to ride in an unknown country

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