TO ALMEDA IN NEW ENGLAND.

———

BY JAMES T. FIELDS.

———

Tell me not of greener mountains,Far away in other lands,Nor of “Afric’s sunny fountains”Rolling over “golden sands”⁠—These few flowers to me recallFairer visions than they all!Strange that things which soonest perish,Dying oft with close of day,Memory will most fondly cherish,When their bloom has passed away⁠—Storms cannot efface foreverBounding barks from youth’s bright river!Then, lady, take this idle sonnet,Fragile though the lines may be;I’m thinking of a Quaker bonnet,I wonder if you’ll think of meNext season, when you fold with careThis crumpled leafto curl your hair!

Tell me not of greener mountains,Far away in other lands,Nor of “Afric’s sunny fountains”Rolling over “golden sands”⁠—These few flowers to me recallFairer visions than they all!

Tell me not of greener mountains,

Far away in other lands,

Nor of “Afric’s sunny fountains”

Rolling over “golden sands”⁠—

These few flowers to me recall

Fairer visions than they all!

Strange that things which soonest perish,Dying oft with close of day,Memory will most fondly cherish,When their bloom has passed away⁠—Storms cannot efface foreverBounding barks from youth’s bright river!

Strange that things which soonest perish,

Dying oft with close of day,

Memory will most fondly cherish,

When their bloom has passed away⁠—

Storms cannot efface forever

Bounding barks from youth’s bright river!

Then, lady, take this idle sonnet,Fragile though the lines may be;I’m thinking of a Quaker bonnet,I wonder if you’ll think of meNext season, when you fold with careThis crumpled leafto curl your hair!

Then, lady, take this idle sonnet,

Fragile though the lines may be;

I’m thinking of a Quaker bonnet,

I wonder if you’ll think of me

Next season, when you fold with care

This crumpled leafto curl your hair!

THE PLAYFUL PETS.

Sure never yet were pets so sleek,So full of sportive play;With them the gentle MarianWill while the hours away.Ah! childhood has a happinessTo other years unknown,A joy it finds in slightest things,A word, a look, a tone!To it of brighter worlds aboveDim glimpses oft are given—Alas! that age, which wisdom gains,Should draw us down from Heaven.C.

Sure never yet were pets so sleek,So full of sportive play;With them the gentle MarianWill while the hours away.

Sure never yet were pets so sleek,

So full of sportive play;

With them the gentle Marian

Will while the hours away.

Ah! childhood has a happinessTo other years unknown,A joy it finds in slightest things,A word, a look, a tone!

Ah! childhood has a happiness

To other years unknown,

A joy it finds in slightest things,

A word, a look, a tone!

To it of brighter worlds aboveDim glimpses oft are given—Alas! that age, which wisdom gains,Should draw us down from Heaven.C.

To it of brighter worlds above

Dim glimpses oft are given—

Alas! that age, which wisdom gains,

Should draw us down from Heaven.

a young girl with a dog and puppiesPAINTED BY W. DRUMMONDENGRAVED BY J. SARTAINThe Playful Pets.Engraved expressly for Graham’s Magazine.

PAINTED BY W. DRUMMONDENGRAVED BY J. SARTAIN

THE POETRY OF RUFUS DAWES.

A RETROSPECTIVE CRITICISM.

———

BY EDGAR A. POE.

———

“As a poet,” says Mr. Griswold, in his late “Poets and Poetry of America,” “the standing of Mr. Dawes is as yet unsettled; there being a wide difference of opinion respecting his writings.” Thewidthof this difference is apparent; and, while to many it is matter for wonder, to those who have the interest of our Literature at heart, it is, more properly, a source of mortification and regret. That the author in question has long enjoyed what we term “a high poetical reputation,” cannot be denied; and in no manner is this point more strikingly evinced than in the choice of his works, some two years since, by one of our most enterprising publishers, as theinitialvolume of a series, the avowed object of which was the setting forth, in the best array of paper, type and pictorial embellishment, theéliteof the American poets. As a writer of occasional stanzas he has been long before the public; always eliciting, from a great variety of sources,unqualifiedcommendation. With the exception of a solitary remark, adventured by ourselves in “A Chapter on Autography,” there has been no written dissent from the universal opinion in his favor—the universalapparentopinion. Mr. Griswold’s observation must be understood, we presume, as referring to theconversationalopinion upon this topic; or it is not impossible that he holds in view the difference between the criticism of the newspaper paragraphs and the private comment of the educated and intelligent. Be this as it may, the rapidly growing “reputation” of our poet was much enhanced by the publication of his first compositions “of length,” and attained its climax, we believe, upon the public recitation, by himself, of a tragic drama, in five acts, entitled “Athenia of Damascus,” to a large assembly of admiring and applaudingfriends, gathered together for the occasion in one of the halls of the University of New York.

This popular decision, so frequent and so public, in regard to the poetical ability of Mr. Dawes, might be received as evidence of his actual merit (and by thousands itisso received) were it not too scandalously at variance with a species of criticism whichwill notbe resisted—with the perfectly simple precepts of the very commonest common sense. The peculiarity of Mr. Griswold’s observation has induced us to make inquiry into the true character of the volume to which we have before alluded, and which embraces, we believe, the chief portion of the published verse-compositions of its author.[5]This inquiry has but resulted in the confirmation of our previous opinion; and we now hesitate not to say, that no man in America has been more shamefully over-estimated than the one who forms the subject of this article. We say shamefully; for, though a better day is now dawning upon our literary interests, and a laudation so indiscriminate will never be sanctioned again—the laudation in this instance, as it stands upon record, must be regarded as a laughable although bitter satire upon the general zeal, accuracy and independence of that critical spirit which, but a few years ago, pervaded and degraded the land.

[5]“Geraldine,” “Athenia of Damascus,” and Miscellaneous Poems. By Rufus Dawes. Published by Samuel Colman, New York.

[5]

“Geraldine,” “Athenia of Damascus,” and Miscellaneous Poems. By Rufus Dawes. Published by Samuel Colman, New York.

In what we shall say we have no intention of being profound. Here is a case in which any thing like analysis would be utterly thrown away. Our purpose (which is truth) will be more fully answered by an unvarnished exposition of fact. It appears to us, indeed, that in excessivegeneralizationlies one of the leading errors of a criticism employed upon a poetical literature so immature as our own. We rhapsodize rather than discriminate; delighting more in the dictation or discussion of a principle, than in its particular and methodical application. The wildest and most erratic effusion of the Muse, not utterly worthless, will be found more or less indebted tomethodfor whatever of value it embodies; and we shall discover, conversely, that, in any analysis of even this wildest effusion, we labor without method only to labor without end. There is little reason for that vagueness of comment which, of late, we so pertinaciously affect, and which has been brought into fashion, no doubt, through the proverbial facility and security of merely general remark. In regard to the leading principles of true poesy, these, we think, stand not at all in need of the elucidation hourly wasted upon them. Founded in the unerring instincts of our nature, they are enduring and immutable. In a rigid scrutiny of any number of directly conflicting opinions upon a poetical topic, we will not fail to perceive that principles identical in every important point have been, in each opinion, either asserted, or intimated, or unwittingly allowed an influence. The differences of decision arose simply from those of application; and from such variety in the applied, rather than in the conceived idea, sprang, undoubtedly, the absurd distinctions of the “schools.”

“Geraldine” is the title of the first and longest poem in the volume before us. It embraces some three hundred and fifty stanzas—the whole being a most servile imitation of the “Don Juan” of Lord Byron. The outrageous absurdity of the systematicdigressionin the British original, was so managed as to form not a little portion of its infinite interest and humor; and the fine discrimination of the writer pointed out to him a limit beyond which he never ventured with this tantalizing species of drollery. “Geraldine” may be regarded, however, as a simple embodiment of the whole soul of digression. It is a mere mass of irrelevancy, amid the madfarragoof which we detect with difficulty even the faintest vestige of a narrative, and where the continuous lapse from impertinence to impertinence is seldom justified by any shadow of appositeness or even of the commonest relation.

To afford the reader any proper conception of thestoryis of course a matter of difficulty; we must content ourselves with a mere outline of the general conduct. This we shall endeavor to give without indulgence in those feelings of risibility stirred up in us by the primitive perusal. We shall rigorously avoid every species of exaggeration, and confine ourselves, with perfect honesty, to the conveyance of a distinct image.

“Geraldine,” then, opens with some four or five stanzas descriptive of a sylvan scene in America. We could, perhaps, render Mr. Dawes’ poetical reputation no greater service than by the quotation of these simple verses in full.

I know a spot where poets fain would dwell,To gather flowers and food for after thought,As bees draw honey from the rose’s cell,To hive among the treasures they have wrought;And there a cottage from a sylvan screenSent up a curling smoke amidst the green.Around that hermit home of quietudeThe elm trees whispered with the summer air,And nothing ever ventured to intrudeBut happy birds that caroled wildly there,Or honey-laden harvesters that flewHumming away to drink the morning dew.Around the door the honey-suckle climbedAnd Multa-flora spread her countless roses,And never poet sang nor minstrel rhymedRomantic scene where happiness reposes,Sweeter to sense than that enchanting dellWhere home-sick memory fondly loves to dwell.Beneath a mountain’s brow the cottage stood,Hard by a shelving lake whose pebbled bedWas skirted by the drapery of a woodThat hung its festoon foliage over head,Where wild deer came at eve unharmed, to drink,While moonlight threw their shadows from the brink.The green earth heaved her giant waves around,Where, through the mountain vista, one vast heightTowered heavenward without peer, his forehead boundWith gorgeous clouds, at times of changeful light,While, far below, the lake in bridal restSlept with his glorious picture on her breast.

I know a spot where poets fain would dwell,

To gather flowers and food for after thought,

As bees draw honey from the rose’s cell,

To hive among the treasures they have wrought;

And there a cottage from a sylvan screen

Sent up a curling smoke amidst the green.

Around that hermit home of quietudeThe elm trees whispered with the summer air,And nothing ever ventured to intrudeBut happy birds that caroled wildly there,Or honey-laden harvesters that flewHumming away to drink the morning dew.

Around that hermit home of quietude

The elm trees whispered with the summer air,

And nothing ever ventured to intrude

But happy birds that caroled wildly there,

Or honey-laden harvesters that flew

Humming away to drink the morning dew.

Around the door the honey-suckle climbedAnd Multa-flora spread her countless roses,And never poet sang nor minstrel rhymedRomantic scene where happiness reposes,Sweeter to sense than that enchanting dellWhere home-sick memory fondly loves to dwell.

Around the door the honey-suckle climbed

And Multa-flora spread her countless roses,

And never poet sang nor minstrel rhymed

Romantic scene where happiness reposes,

Sweeter to sense than that enchanting dell

Where home-sick memory fondly loves to dwell.

Beneath a mountain’s brow the cottage stood,Hard by a shelving lake whose pebbled bedWas skirted by the drapery of a woodThat hung its festoon foliage over head,Where wild deer came at eve unharmed, to drink,While moonlight threw their shadows from the brink.

Beneath a mountain’s brow the cottage stood,

Hard by a shelving lake whose pebbled bed

Was skirted by the drapery of a wood

That hung its festoon foliage over head,

Where wild deer came at eve unharmed, to drink,

While moonlight threw their shadows from the brink.

The green earth heaved her giant waves around,Where, through the mountain vista, one vast heightTowered heavenward without peer, his forehead boundWith gorgeous clouds, at times of changeful light,While, far below, the lake in bridal restSlept with his glorious picture on her breast.

The green earth heaved her giant waves around,

Where, through the mountain vista, one vast height

Towered heavenward without peer, his forehead bound

With gorgeous clouds, at times of changeful light,

While, far below, the lake in bridal rest

Slept with his glorious picture on her breast.

Here is an air of quietude in good keeping with the theme; the “giant waves” in the last stanza redeem it from much exception otherwise; and perhaps we need say nothing at all of the suspicious-looking compound “multa-flora.” Had Mr. Dawes always written even nearly so well, we should have been spared to-day the painful task imposed upon us by a stern sense of our critical duty. These passages are followed immediately by an address or invocation to “Peerless America,” including apostrophes to Allston and Claude Lorraine.

We now learn the name of the tenant of the cottage, which isWilton, and ascertain that he has an only daughter. A single stanza quoted at this juncture will aid the reader’s conception of the queer tone of philosophical rhapsody with which the poem teems, and some specimen of which is invariably made to follow each little modicum of incident.

How like the heart is to an instrumentA touch can wake to gladness or to wo!How like the circumambient elementThe spirit with its undulating flow!The heart—the soul—Oh, Mother Nature, whyThis universal bond of sympathy.

How like the heart is to an instrument

A touch can wake to gladness or to wo!

How like the circumambient element

The spirit with its undulating flow!

The heart—the soul—Oh, Mother Nature, why

This universal bond of sympathy.

After two pages much in this manner, we are told thatGeraldineis the name of the maiden, and are informed, with comparatively little circumlocution, of her character. She is beautiful, and kind-hearted, and somewhat romantic, and “some thought her reason touched”—for which we have little disposition to blame them. There is now much about Kant and Fichte; about Schelling, Hegel and Cousin; (which latter is made to rhyme withgang;) about Milton, Byron, Homer, Spinoza, David Hume and Mirabeau; and a good deal, too, about thescribendi cacoïthes, in which an evident misunderstanding of the quantity ofcacoïthesbrings, again, into very disagreeable suspicion the writer’s cognizance of the Latin tongue. At this point we may refer, also, to such absurdities as

Truth with her thousand-folded robe of errorClose shut in hersarcophagiof terror⁠—

Truth with her thousand-folded robe of error

Close shut in hersarcophagiof terror⁠—

And

Wherecandelabrisilver the white halls.

Now, no one is presupposed to be cognizant of any language beyond his own; to be ignorant of Latin is no crime; to pretend a knowledge is beneath contempt; and the pretender will attempt in vain to utter or to write two consecutive phrases of a foreign idiom, without betraying his deficiency to those who are conversant.

At page 39, there is some prospect of a progress in the story. Here we are introduced to a Mr. Acus and his fair daughter, Miss Alice.

Acus had been a dashing Bond street tailorSome few short years before, who took his measuresSo carefully he always cut the jailorAnd filled his coffers with exhaustless treasures;Then with his wife, a son, and three fair daughters,He sunk the goose and straightway crossed the waters.

Acus had been a dashing Bond street tailor

Some few short years before, who took his measures

So carefully he always cut the jailor

And filled his coffers with exhaustless treasures;

Then with his wife, a son, and three fair daughters,

He sunk the goose and straightway crossed the waters.

His residence is in the immediate vicinity of Wilton. The daughter, Miss Alice, who is said to be quite a belle, is enamored of one Waldron, a foreigner, a lion, and a gentleman of questionable reputation. His character (which for our life and soul we cannot comprehend) is given within the space of some forty or fifty stanzas, made to include, at the same time, an essay on motives, deduced from the text “whatever is must be,” and illuminated by a long note at the end of the poem, wherein thesystime(queresystéme?)de la Natureis sturdily attacked. Let us speak the truth; this note (and the whole of them, for there are many,) may be regarded as a glorious specimen of the concentrated essence of rigmarole, and, to say nothing of their utter absurdityper se, are so ludicrously uncalled-for, and grotesquely out of place, that we found it impossible to refrain, during their perusal, from a most unbecoming and uproarious guffaw. We will be pardoned for giving a specimen—selecting it for its brevity.

Reason, he deemed, could measure every thing,And reason told him that there was a lawOf mental action which must ever flingA death-bolt at all faith, and this he sawWas Transference. (14)

Reason, he deemed, could measure every thing,

And reason told him that there was a law

Of mental action which must ever fling

A death-bolt at all faith, and this he saw

Was Transference. (14)

Turning to Note 14, we read thus⁠—

“If any one has a curiosity to look into this subject, (does Mr. Dawesreallythink any one so great a fool?) and wishes to see how far the force of reasoning and analysis may carry him, independently of revelation, I would suggest (thank you, sir,) such inquiries as the following:“Whether the first Philosophy, considered in relation to Physics, was first in time?“How far our moral perceptions have been influenced by natural phenomena?“How far our metaphysical notions of cause and effect are attributable to the transference of notions connected with logical language?”

“Whether the first Philosophy, considered in relation to Physics, was first in time?

“How far our moral perceptions have been influenced by natural phenomena?

“How far our metaphysical notions of cause and effect are attributable to the transference of notions connected with logical language?”

And all this in a poem about Acus, a tailor!

Waldron prefers, unhappily, Geraldine to Alice, and Geraldine returns his love, exciting thus the deep indignation of the neglected fair one,

whom love and jealousy bear upTo mingle poison in her rival’s cup.

whom love and jealousy bear up

To mingle poison in her rival’s cup.

Miss A. has among her adorers one of the genus loafer, whose appellation, not improperly, is Bore. B. is acquainted with a milliner—the milliner of the disconsolate lady.

She made this milliner her friend, who swore,To work her full revenge through Mr. Bore.

She made this milliner her friend, who swore,

To work her full revenge through Mr. Bore.

And now says the poet—

I leave your sympathetic fancies,To fill the outline of this pencil sketch.

I leave your sympathetic fancies,

To fill the outline of this pencil sketch.

This filling has been, with us at least, a matter of no little difficulty. We believe, however, that the affair is intended to run thus:—Waldron is enticed to some vile sins by Bore, and the knowledge of these, on the part of Alice, places the former gentleman in her power.

We are now introduced to afête champêtreat the residence of Acus, who, by the way, has a son, Clifford, a suitor to Geraldine with the approbation of her father—that good old gentleman, for whom our sympathies were excited in the beginning of things, being influenced by the consideration that this scion of the house of the tailor will inherit a plum. The worst of the whole is, however, that the romantic Geraldine, who should have known better, and who loves Waldron, loves also the young knight of the shears. The consequence is a rencontre of the rival suitors at thefête champêtre; Waldron knocking his antagonist on the head, and throwing him into the lake. The murderer, as well as we can make out the narrative, now joins a piratical band, among whom he alternately cuts throats and sings songs of his own composition. In the mean time the deserted Geraldine mourns alone, till, upon a certain day,

A shape stood by her like a thing of air⁠—She started—Waldron’s haggard face was there.. . . . . . . . .He laid her gently down, of sense bereft,And sunk his picture on her bosom’s snow,And close beside these lines in blood he left:“Farewell forever, Geraldine, I goAnother woman’s victim—dare I tell?’Tis Alice!—curse us, Geraldine!—farewell!”

A shape stood by her like a thing of air⁠—She started—Waldron’s haggard face was there.

A shape stood by her like a thing of air⁠—

She started—Waldron’s haggard face was there.

. . . . . . . . .

He laid her gently down, of sense bereft,And sunk his picture on her bosom’s snow,And close beside these lines in blood he left:“Farewell forever, Geraldine, I goAnother woman’s victim—dare I tell?’Tis Alice!—curse us, Geraldine!—farewell!”

He laid her gently down, of sense bereft,

And sunk his picture on her bosom’s snow,

And close beside these lines in blood he left:

“Farewell forever, Geraldine, I go

Another woman’s victim—dare I tell?

’Tis Alice!—curse us, Geraldine!—farewell!”

There is no possibility of denying the fact: thisisa droll piece of business. The lover brings forth a miniature, (Mr. Dawes has a passion for miniatures,)sinksit in the bosom of the lady, cuts his finger, and writes with the blood an epistle, (whereis not specified, but we presume he indites it upon the bosom as it is “close beside” the picture,) in which epistle he announces that he is “another woman’s victim,” giving us to understand that he himself is a woman after all, and concluding with the delicious bit of Billingsgate

dare I tell?’Tis Alice!—curse us, Geraldine!—farewell!

dare I tell?

’Tis Alice!—curse us, Geraldine!—farewell!

We suppose, however, that “curse us” is a misprint; for why should Geraldine curse both herself and her lover?—it should have been “curse it!” no doubt. The whole passage, perhaps, would have read better thus⁠—

oh, my eye!’Tis Alice!—d—n it, Geraldine!—good bye!

oh, my eye!

’Tis Alice!—d—n it, Geraldine!—good bye!

The remainder of the narrative may be briefly summed up. Waldron returns to his professional engagements with the pirates, while Geraldine, attended by her father, goes to sea for the benefit of her health. The consequence is inevitable. The vessels of the separated lovers meet and engage in the most diabolical of conflicts. Both are blown all to pieces. In a boat from one vessel, Waldron escapes—in a boat from the other, the lady Geraldine. Now, as a second natural consequence, the parties meet again—Destiny is every thing in such cases. Well, the parties meet again. The lady Geraldine has “that miniature” about her neck, and the circumstance proves too much for the excited state of mind of Mr. Waldron. He just seizes her ladyship, therefore, by the small of the waist and incontinently leaps with her into the sea.

However intolerably absurd this skeleton of the story may appear, a thorough perusal will convince the reader that the entire fabric is even more so. It is impossible to convey, in any such digest as we have given, a full idea of theniaiserieswith which the narrative abounds. An utter want ofkeepingis especially manifest throughout. In the most solemnly serious passages we have, for example, incidents of the world of 1839, jumbled up with the distorted mythology of the Greeks. Our conclusion of the drama, as we just gave it, was perhaps ludicrous enough; but how much more preposterous does it appear in the grave language of the poet himself!

And round her neck the miniature was hungOf him who gazed with Hell’s unmingled wo;He saw her, kissed her cheek, and wildly flungHis arms around her with a mad’ning throw⁠—Then plunged within the cold unfathomed deepWhile sirens sang their victim to his sleep!

And round her neck the miniature was hung

Of him who gazed with Hell’s unmingled wo;

He saw her, kissed her cheek, and wildly flung

His arms around her with a mad’ning throw⁠—

Then plunged within the cold unfathomed deep

While sirens sang their victim to his sleep!

Only think of a group ofsirenssinging to sleep a modern “miniatured” flirt, kicking about in the water with a New York dandy in tight pantaloons!

But not even these stupidities would suffice to justify a total condemnation of the poetry of Mr. Dawes. We have known follies very similar committed by men of real ability, and have been induced to disregard them in earnest admiration of the brilliancy of the minor beauty ofstyle. Simplicity, perspicuity and vigor, or a well-disciplined ornateness, of language, have done wonders for the reputation of many a writer really deficient in the higher and more essential qualities of the Muse. But upon these minor points of manner our poet has not even the shadow of a shadow to sustain him. His works, in this respect, may be regarded as a theatrical world of mere verbiage, somewhat speciously bedizzened with a tinselly meaning well adapted to the eyes of the rabble. There is not a page of any thing that he has written which will bear, for an instant, the scrutiny of a critical eye. Exceedingly fond of the glitter of metaphor, he has not the capacity to manage it, and, in the awkward attempt, jumbles together the most incongruous of ornament. Let us take any passage of “Geraldine” by way of exemplification.

——Thy rivers swell the sea—In one eternal diapason pourThy cataracts the hymn of liberty,Teaching the clouds to thunder.

——Thy rivers swell the sea—

In one eternal diapason pour

Thy cataracts the hymn of liberty,

Teaching the clouds to thunder.

Here we have cataracts teaching clouds to thunder—and how? By means of a hymn.

Why should chromatic discord charm the earAnd smiles and tears stream o’er with troubled joy?

Why should chromatic discord charm the ear

And smiles and tears stream o’er with troubled joy?

Tears may stream over, but not smiles.

Then comes the breathing time of young Romance,The June of life, when summer’s earliest rayWarms the red arteries, that bound and danceWith soft voluptuous impulses at play,While the full heart sends forth as from a hiveA thousand winged messengers alive.

Then comes the breathing time of young Romance,

The June of life, when summer’s earliest ray

Warms the red arteries, that bound and dance

With soft voluptuous impulses at play,

While the full heart sends forth as from a hive

A thousand winged messengers alive.

Let us reduce this to a simple statement, and we have—what? The earliest ray of summer warming red arteries, which are bounding and dancing, and playing with a parcel of urchins, called voluptuous impulses, while the bee-hive of a heart attached to these dancing arteries is at the same time sending forth a swarm of its innocent little inhabitants.

The eyes were like the sapphire of deep air,The garb that distance robes elysium in,But oh, so much of heaven lingered thereThe wayward heart forgot its blissful sinAnd worshiped all Religion well forbidsBeneath the silken fringes of their lids.

The eyes were like the sapphire of deep air,

The garb that distance robes elysium in,

But oh, so much of heaven lingered there

The wayward heart forgot its blissful sin

And worshiped all Religion well forbids

Beneath the silken fringes of their lids.

Thatdistanceisnotthe cause of the sapphire of the sky, is not to our present purpose. We wish merely to call attention to the verbiage of the stanza. It is impossible to put the latter portion of it into any thing like intelligible prose. So much of heaven lingered in the lady’s eyes that the wayward heart forgot its blissful sin, and worshiped every thing which religion forbids, beneath the silken fringes of the lady’s eyelids. This we cannot be compelled to understand, and shall therefore say nothing further about it.

She loved to lend Imagination wingAnd link her heart with Juliet’s in a dream,And feel the music of a sister stringThat thrilled the current of her vital stream.

She loved to lend Imagination wing

And link her heart with Juliet’s in a dream,

And feel the music of a sister string

That thrilled the current of her vital stream.

How delightful a picture we have here! A lady is lending one of her wings to the spirit, or genius, called Imagination, who, of course, has lost one of his own. While thus employed with one hand, with the other she is chaining her heart to the heart of the fair Juliet. At the same time she is feeling the music of a sister string, and this string is thrilling the current of the lady’s vital stream. If this is downright nonsense we cannot be held responsible for its perpetration; it is but the downright nonsense of Mr. Dawes.

Again—

Without the Palinurus of self-scienceByron embarked upon the stormy sea,To adverse breezes hurling his defianceAnd dashing up the rainbows on his lee,And chasing those he made in wildest mirth,Or sending back their images to earth.

Without the Palinurus of self-science

Byron embarked upon the stormy sea,

To adverse breezes hurling his defiance

And dashing up the rainbows on his lee,

And chasing those he made in wildest mirth,

Or sending back their images to earth.

This stanza we have more than once seen quoted as a fine specimen of the poetical powers of our author. His lordship, no doubt, is herein made to cut a very remarkable figure. Let us imagine him, for one moment, embarked upon a stormy sea, hurling his defiance (literally throwing his gauntlet or glove) to the adverse breezes, dashing up rainbows on his lee, laughing at them, and chasing them at the same time, and, in conclusion, “sending back their images to earth.” But we have already wearied the reader with this abominable rigmarole. We shall be pardoned (after the many specimens thus given at random) for not carrying out the design we originally intended: that of commenting upon two or three successive pages of “Geraldine,” with a view of showing (in a spirit apparently more fair than that of particular selection) theentirenesswith which the whole poem is pervaded by unintelligibility. To every thinking mind, however, this would seem a work of supererogation. In such matters, by such understandings, the brick of theskolastikoswill be received implicitly as a sample of the house. The writercapable, to any extent, of such absurdity as we have pointed out,cannot, by any possibility, produce a long article worth reading. We say this in the very teeth of the magnificent assembly which listened to the recital of Mr. Dawes, in the great hall of the University of New York. We shall leave “Athenia of Damascus,” without comment, to the decision of those who may find time and temper for its perusal, and conclude our extracts by a quotation, from among the minor poems, of the following very respectable

ANACREONTIC.Fill again the mantling bowlNor fear to meet the morning breaking!None but slaves should bend the soulBeneath the chains of mortal making:Fill your beakers to the brim,Bacchus soon shall lull your sorrow;Let delightBut crown the night,And care may bring her clouds to-morrow.Mark this cup of rosy wineWith virgin pureness deeply blushing;Beauty pressed it from the vineWhile Love stood by to charm its gushing;He who dares to drain it nowShall drink such bliss as seldom gladdens;The Moslem’s dreamWould joyless seemTo him whose brain its rapture maddens.Pleasure sparkles on the brim⁠—Lethe lies far deeper in it⁠—Both, enticing, wait for himWhose heart is warm enough to win it;Hearts like ours, if e’er they chillSoon with love again must lighten.Skies may wearA darksome airWhere sunshine most is known to brighten.Then fill, fill high the mantling bowl!Nor fear to meet the morning breaking;Care shall never cloud the soulWhile Beauty’s beaming eyes are waking.Fill your beakers to the brim,Bacchus soon shall lull your sorrow;Let delightBut crown the night,And care may bring her clouds to-morrow.

ANACREONTIC.

Fill again the mantling bowlNor fear to meet the morning breaking!None but slaves should bend the soulBeneath the chains of mortal making:Fill your beakers to the brim,Bacchus soon shall lull your sorrow;Let delightBut crown the night,And care may bring her clouds to-morrow.

Fill again the mantling bowl

Nor fear to meet the morning breaking!

None but slaves should bend the soul

Beneath the chains of mortal making:

Fill your beakers to the brim,

Bacchus soon shall lull your sorrow;

Let delight

But crown the night,

And care may bring her clouds to-morrow.

Mark this cup of rosy wineWith virgin pureness deeply blushing;Beauty pressed it from the vineWhile Love stood by to charm its gushing;He who dares to drain it nowShall drink such bliss as seldom gladdens;The Moslem’s dreamWould joyless seemTo him whose brain its rapture maddens.

Mark this cup of rosy wine

With virgin pureness deeply blushing;

Beauty pressed it from the vine

While Love stood by to charm its gushing;

He who dares to drain it now

Shall drink such bliss as seldom gladdens;

The Moslem’s dream

Would joyless seem

To him whose brain its rapture maddens.

Pleasure sparkles on the brim⁠—Lethe lies far deeper in it⁠—Both, enticing, wait for himWhose heart is warm enough to win it;Hearts like ours, if e’er they chillSoon with love again must lighten.Skies may wearA darksome airWhere sunshine most is known to brighten.

Pleasure sparkles on the brim⁠—

Lethe lies far deeper in it⁠—

Both, enticing, wait for him

Whose heart is warm enough to win it;

Hearts like ours, if e’er they chill

Soon with love again must lighten.

Skies may wear

A darksome air

Where sunshine most is known to brighten.

Then fill, fill high the mantling bowl!Nor fear to meet the morning breaking;Care shall never cloud the soulWhile Beauty’s beaming eyes are waking.Fill your beakers to the brim,Bacchus soon shall lull your sorrow;Let delightBut crown the night,And care may bring her clouds to-morrow.

Then fill, fill high the mantling bowl!

Nor fear to meet the morning breaking;

Care shall never cloud the soul

While Beauty’s beaming eyes are waking.

Fill your beakers to the brim,

Bacchus soon shall lull your sorrow;

Let delight

But crown the night,

And care may bring her clouds to-morrow.

Whatever shall be, hereafter, the position of Mr. Dawes in the poetical world, he will be indebted for it altogether to his shorter compositions, some of which have the merit of tenderness; others of melody and force. What seems to be the popular opinion in respect to his more voluminous effusions, has been brought about, in some measure, by a certain generaltact, nearly amounting to taste, and more nearly the converse of talent. This tact has been especially displayed in the choice of not inelegant titles and other externals; in a peculiar imitative speciousness of manner, pervading the surface of his writings; and (here we have the anomaly of a positive benefit deduced from a radical defect) in an absolute deficiency in basis, instamen, in matter, or pungency, which, if even slightly evinced, might have invited the reader to an intimate and understanding perusal, whose result would have been disgust. His poems have not been condemned, only because they have never been read. The glitter upon the surface has sufficed, with the newspaper critic, to justify his hyperboles of praise. Very few persons, we feel assured, have had sufficient nerve to wadethroughthe entire volume now in question, except, as in our own case, with the single object of criticism in view. Mr. Dawes has, also, been aided to a poetical reputation by the amiability of his character as a man. How efficient such causes have before been in producing such effects, is a point but too thoroughly understood.

We have already spoken of the numerousfriendsof the poet; and we shall not here insist upon the fact, thatwebear him no personal ill will. With those who know us, such a declaration would appear supererogatory; and by those who know us not, it would, doubtless, be received with incredulity. What we have said, however, isnotin opposition to Mr. Dawes, nor even so much in opposition to the poems of Mr. Dawes, as in defence of the many true souls which, in Mr. Dawes’ apotheosis, are aggrieved. The laudation of the unworthy is to the worthy the most bitter of all wrong. But it is unbecoming in him who merely demonstrates a truth, to offer reason or apology for the demonstration.

AN AUTUMN REVERIE.

———

BY WILLIAM FALCONER.

———

Hail! ye lone woods, in Nature’s mourning clad;Hail! ye sere leaves, low melting in the breeze;Meet is thy reign, pale Autumn, for the sad,And soft thy solace for the mind’s disease;Again I hail thee, sabbath of the year!Upon us kindly smile, for Winter winds are near!In this cathedral vast, by tall elms reared,While through yon leafy oriel streams the sunOn those old boughs, by many an Autumn searedI’d dream of friends who life’s rude race have run⁠—Whose memory, like rare odor, fills my heart,Nor fades, but richer grows, and is of it a part.Where are the gay plumed warblers of the Spring?Those winged souls, at whose melodious songsThe green leaves danced with joy? On tireless wingTo brighter bowers have flown the golden throngs;But they, when winds are weary of their wrath,Shall fill our groves once more, and glad the woodland path.But what new Spring shall breathe upon thy tombOr summon back friends wintry Death has banished?They grow enamored of those bowers of bloomTo which they soared when from our side they vanished,And ne’er return, or, haply so, unseen⁠—Dwelling in Memory’s dreams, pure, changeless, and serene.Perchance we err, for, though no mortal eyeMay look on Immortality, yet theyMay clothe them in the azure of the sky,Or shroud their light wings in the moon’s pale ray;Or, in the likeness of some mutual star,Smile on repentant tears and soothe our mental war.And art thou present in this solitude,Thou early, only loved, sweet beam of youth?Thou fairest of all Memory’s sisterhood,Bright as a poet’s dream, and pure as Truth!Fair guardian spirit, thou art with me now⁠—It is, it is thy sigh, which stirs the rustling bough!Thee may I meet beneath some kindlier sky,In seraph beauty decked, yet sad—more brightTo me, than when upon my mortal eyeThy fair form glanced, and filled me with delight,When thee I placed within my spirit’s shrineAnd turned on thee each thought, and loved thee as divine.

Hail! ye lone woods, in Nature’s mourning clad;

Hail! ye sere leaves, low melting in the breeze;

Meet is thy reign, pale Autumn, for the sad,

And soft thy solace for the mind’s disease;

Again I hail thee, sabbath of the year!

Upon us kindly smile, for Winter winds are near!

In this cathedral vast, by tall elms reared,While through yon leafy oriel streams the sunOn those old boughs, by many an Autumn searedI’d dream of friends who life’s rude race have run⁠—Whose memory, like rare odor, fills my heart,Nor fades, but richer grows, and is of it a part.

In this cathedral vast, by tall elms reared,

While through yon leafy oriel streams the sun

On those old boughs, by many an Autumn seared

I’d dream of friends who life’s rude race have run⁠—

Whose memory, like rare odor, fills my heart,

Nor fades, but richer grows, and is of it a part.

Where are the gay plumed warblers of the Spring?Those winged souls, at whose melodious songsThe green leaves danced with joy? On tireless wingTo brighter bowers have flown the golden throngs;But they, when winds are weary of their wrath,Shall fill our groves once more, and glad the woodland path.

Where are the gay plumed warblers of the Spring?

Those winged souls, at whose melodious songs

The green leaves danced with joy? On tireless wing

To brighter bowers have flown the golden throngs;

But they, when winds are weary of their wrath,

Shall fill our groves once more, and glad the woodland path.

But what new Spring shall breathe upon thy tombOr summon back friends wintry Death has banished?They grow enamored of those bowers of bloomTo which they soared when from our side they vanished,And ne’er return, or, haply so, unseen⁠—Dwelling in Memory’s dreams, pure, changeless, and serene.

But what new Spring shall breathe upon thy tomb

Or summon back friends wintry Death has banished?

They grow enamored of those bowers of bloom

To which they soared when from our side they vanished,

And ne’er return, or, haply so, unseen⁠—

Dwelling in Memory’s dreams, pure, changeless, and serene.

Perchance we err, for, though no mortal eyeMay look on Immortality, yet theyMay clothe them in the azure of the sky,Or shroud their light wings in the moon’s pale ray;Or, in the likeness of some mutual star,Smile on repentant tears and soothe our mental war.

Perchance we err, for, though no mortal eye

May look on Immortality, yet they

May clothe them in the azure of the sky,

Or shroud their light wings in the moon’s pale ray;

Or, in the likeness of some mutual star,

Smile on repentant tears and soothe our mental war.

And art thou present in this solitude,Thou early, only loved, sweet beam of youth?Thou fairest of all Memory’s sisterhood,Bright as a poet’s dream, and pure as Truth!Fair guardian spirit, thou art with me now⁠—It is, it is thy sigh, which stirs the rustling bough!

And art thou present in this solitude,

Thou early, only loved, sweet beam of youth?

Thou fairest of all Memory’s sisterhood,

Bright as a poet’s dream, and pure as Truth!

Fair guardian spirit, thou art with me now⁠—

It is, it is thy sigh, which stirs the rustling bough!

Thee may I meet beneath some kindlier sky,In seraph beauty decked, yet sad—more brightTo me, than when upon my mortal eyeThy fair form glanced, and filled me with delight,When thee I placed within my spirit’s shrineAnd turned on thee each thought, and loved thee as divine.

Thee may I meet beneath some kindlier sky,

In seraph beauty decked, yet sad—more bright

To me, than when upon my mortal eye

Thy fair form glanced, and filled me with delight,

When thee I placed within my spirit’s shrine

And turned on thee each thought, and loved thee as divine.

MALINA GRAY.

———

BY ANN S. STEPHENS.

———

“How is the warm and loving heart requitedIn this harsh world, where it awhile must dwell;Its best affections wronged, betrayed and slighted⁠—Such is the doom of those who love too well.Better the weary dove should close its pinion,Fold up its golden wings, and be at peace,And early enter that serene dominionWhere earthly cares and earthly sorrows cease”—L. E. L.

“How is the warm and loving heart requited

In this harsh world, where it awhile must dwell;

Its best affections wronged, betrayed and slighted⁠—

Such is the doom of those who love too well.

Better the weary dove should close its pinion,

Fold up its golden wings, and be at peace,

And early enter that serene dominion

Where earthly cares and earthly sorrows cease”

—L. E. L.

Now if I did but possess the magic pencil of my friend Doughty—his glorious power of dashing off a landscape, with all the truthfulness of nature in the outline—fresh and verdant, with shadows rendered almost transparent from the light with which they are so beautifully blended—mellow with that soft hazy atmosphere which hangs forever about his waterfalls, and slumbers along the green slopes where they lie in the sunshine till the gazer becomes almost drowsy as he admires.—If I had but his pencil and his power, instead of this golden pen and the one drop of ink which stains its point, never was there a more lovely picture than I would paint for your especial gratification. I would throw upon the canvass my own birth-place, a quiet old-fashioned village of Connecticut, one of the greenest and most picturesque spots that human eye ever dwelt upon, or that human ingenuity ever contrived to destroy. But alas! Doughty’s genius can alone inspire his pencil, and a rudepen sketchfrom memory is all the idea that I can give you of “our village.”

Imagine for a moment that we are standing on a picturesque old bridge down in a valley, through which a river of some considerable magnitude is wending its way to a juncture with the Housatonic.

We are looking to the north—your hand rests on the mouldering beams which form a side railing to the bridge, and as your eye is lifted from the deep waters at our feet, where they circle and whirl around the dark and sodden supporters, it is caught by one of the most beautiful waterfalls that ever cooled the summer air with its spray. A little up the stream, it foams and flashes over a solid ledge of rocks like an army of laughing children romping together and running races in the sunshine. Now and then you catch a flash of prismatic color just beginning to weave itself amid the water-drops that are forever flashing up as if to provoke the sunshine into forming a rainbow, and then your attention is drawn away by the wreaths of snowy foam and the thousand dimpling whirlpools that form beneath the fall and melt idly upon the more quiet waters long before they reach the dark shadow flung downward from the bridge.

Is not that a magnificent bank stretching along the river’s brink far above the fall?—here, looming up in a broken mass of rocks—there, falling with a gentle slope to the water’s brink, sometimes cut into defiles and hollows by the rivulets that feed the brook, and everywhere covered with the quivering green of spring, the feathery red maple—wild-cherry trees, white with spring blossoms, and whole thickets of starry dog-wood flowers all tangled and luxuriating between sun and water. With what majesty the bank sweeps back at the fall, giving breadth to the valley below and hedging in, with its green rampart, this beautiful little plain with its fine grove which lies on our left, nestled almost entirely within its shadow! Now look down the stream. Follow the bank as it curves inward again, encompassing the rich surface of level ground in a semicircular sweep, till it terminates down the stream yonder, in a pile of rocks and foliage, half hill half mountain. There the river joins it again—winds around the precipice which forms its base, and is lost to sight, as if it terminated amid the dense shadows which lie sleeping there. Did you ever see anything more superb than that lofty pile of rocks and verdure, standing out over the very river, like a glorious old garrison guarding the passage? Its topmost trees are lost in a pile of fleecy clouds—the steep surface is burdened with foliage, and beautifully broken up with lights and shadows. See the sunshine flickering over those massive rocks and kindling with its silvery light the grape-vines that creep among the young trees, rooted in the clefts. A picturesque feature, in our sketch, is that old Castle-rock, and many a holiday have I spent, with a troop of school-mates, amid its clefts, piling up the rich mosses we found there, gathering honey-suckle apples, and sometimes doing terrible execution on the poor garter-snakes that crept harmlessly from their nests to sleep in the sunshine.

Turn once more, and mark how, like a serpent creeping through the thrifty herbage, the road leads, from the bridge where we stand, across the level ground and up the bank! See where it begins to curve back from the fall, till it is lost amid the trees and shrubbery which but half conceal that cluster of white houses standing against the sky so far above us, and looking so quiet and rural among the fresh trees. Can any thing appear more religious than that white church in their midst, rising from its bed of vegetation and throwing the shadow of its taper steeple aslant the graves that are gathered to the very brink of the hill? How distinct are the white gravestones and the long grass shivering among them! My mother’s grave is there beneath the old oak standing alone in that solitary graveyard. My playmates never went with me there, but often have I lingered beneath that old tree, listening to the music of its restless leaves, and the rushing waters below me, till aspirations awoke in my young heart, holy and deep as ever the pride of my womanhood has known. At nightfall I have wandered amid those graves—a little child, and yet fearless—till the stars have stationed themselves in the blue heavens above me, and the fireflies have flashed their tiny brilliants among the grass, like gentle spirits sent to light up the places of the dead; and thoughts, for which I had no name, would fill my heart with pleasant sadness till I went away, reluctantly, amid feelings that haunted me at night as I listened to the acorns rattling from the oak trees over the roof of our house, and colored my dreams long after the dash of the waterfall had lulled me to sleep.

I have wearied you, with my reminiscences, so you have turned away from the houses on Fall’s-hill, to those on the opposite bank, which we have scarcely noticed yet. The hill which forms this side of the valley, is neither so lofty nor picturesque as the other. You will observe that the road branches off at that end of the bridge—that the turnpike which lends to the old Presbyterian meeting-house, and the dwellings which surround it, is cut through the bank some thirty feet down, but forms a steep ascent to the most thickly settled portion of our village. The roof of our old meeting-house—the belfry of our new academy, with the third story window blinds, all fresh and verdant with green paint—half the front of a dry goods store, with the gable end of a red farm-house, are all the signs of life which we can obtain from our station on the bridge—yet the most thrifty and industrious portion of our village is located on School-hill. The Episcopal church, and the white cottages opposite, can boast more of rural beauty, perhaps; but that old meeting-house has stood on School-hill almost a century, and many of the farmers who surround it have grown rich upon lands which they inherited from men who worshiped beneath its roof almost before the rafters were shingled.

Now permit me to draw your attention to the little plain at our left, in the river vale, between the two portions of our village, lying green, and fresh, like a garden run wild, and, but for one cottage house, left to its own leafy solitude. A magnificent grove of white pines stoops and murmurs to the wind as it draws down the valley, the tufted boughs give out a healthy odor, and in their shadows are a thousand grassy nooks and hollows filled with wild blossoms that give a richer fragrance to the air. I have said there was but one house in the river vale. A little back from the river’s brink, and just beyond the clump of chesnuts at the end of the bridge, are two large oak trees, sheltering, and almost hiding a low cottage house. A flower garden is in front, and a sweep of rich sward rolls from the back parlor windows down to the water’s edge. It is a quiet rural dwelling, and the home of my childhood. Does it not look sequestered and deliciously cool? That waterfall, which sounds a perpetual anthem night and day, can be seen from the windows. The fine grove forever spreads its sea of green in front, and here are the old bridge, the village cut into fragments, and the rough hills giving a dash of the sublime to what is in itself so beautiful!

There is yet another object which cannot be seen from the bridge, but from our cottage door we may trace the road which branches off from the turnpike at the opposite end where it winds along the river’s margin till it reaches a spot just opposite Castle-rock. There the high bank crowds close down to the water, thus forcing the projectors of the road to lead it up the brow of the hill, where a growth of underwood and some few trees that have been left standing partially conceal its course, and the exact spot where a cross road from School-hill intersects it. But just at that point and directly opposite the highest peak of Castle-rock, stood a handsome white dwelling-house, with green blinds and a portico of lattice work, covered half the year with crimson trumpet flowers and cinnamon roses. In the winter, when the trees were leafless, we had a full view of this house from our cottage, and could almost distinguish its inmates as they passed in and out through the portico. Even in the summer, its white walls might here and there be seen gleaming through the green foliage, and very frequently the figures of two young girls appeared at night-fall wandering through the garden which sloped down the hill, where the flower beds and thickets were at the twilight hour rendered golden by the sun as he plunged over Castle-rock, deluging it with a glory which kindled up the whole landscape.

This house was occupied by a widow, and the two girls were her daughters. The homestead was their joint property, with a small farm which lay further up the hill. They might have had other means of support, but I was too young at the time to be informed on the subject; certain it is that possession, or some other claim to standing which I could not appreciate, gave a distinction to the family which made the widow a sort of village aristocrat, a female leader in the church, and one of those sanctimonious domestic tyrants who profess to do every thing from principle, and to consider those impulses and generous feelings of the heart which are its brightest waters, things to struggle with and pray against. Her husband had been dead many years, and must have been a man of some consequence in the village. Her daughters were pleasant girls, one of them decidedly handsome, but totally unlike both in person and character. Phebe, the eldest, had always been a gentle and quiet child, one of those retiring and sensitive creatures whose whole being seems imbrued with religion, naturally as flowers are with color and perfume. When a mere child she became a member of the old Presbyterian church on School-hill, and this circumstance served to make her a favorite with the mother, and to strengthen that most deceitful of all passions, spiritual pride, in her heart. In the church Mrs. Gray was feared and looked up to, for she was a strong minded, intelligent woman, bland in tone and smooth in manner, but in reality selfish in heart and stubborn of purpose. With these qualities she retained an influence among the brethren which strength of intellect, without goodness of heart, will often acquire over weaker minds, however pure they be, even to a dangerous extent. If the mother was feared and reverenced, little Phebe was loved and petted like a flower among the members—old and young, high and low—all looked with affection on the lamb of their flock, and so she grew up among them, perhaps the purest and sweetest creature that ever bloomed in the bosom of a Christian church. But Malina, the bright, romping, mischievous Malina, with her sunny brown eyes, her rosy cheeks and dimples that played about them like sunshine trembling in the heart of a rose, there was little hope of Malina—poor thing! The good old deacon shook his head gravely when she was mentioned, and more than once, when she had been observed in the widow’s cushioned pew, peeping with a roguish smile from under her gipsy hat, at some schoolmate in the gallery, or smoothing the folds of her muslin dress, and tying her pink sash into all sorts of love knots during service, the clergyman had reproved her with a look from the pulpit, a proceeding which only frightened the dimples from her face and deluged it with crimson for a moment, which impulse of shame was soon followed by a saucy pout of the red lips, a toss of the gipsy bonnet which made the roses on its crown tremble, and perhaps a desperate jerk at the sash which destroyed all the love knots and left the ends crumpled in her lap, while her mother sat frowning majestically all the time, and poor Phebe was doing her best to hide the tears and blushes which her sister’s disgrace had occasioned. Still, though Malina was a romp and a sad reprobate in the estimation of a sect which had made old Connecticut celebrated among the states by the strictness and sobriety of their lives, there was something about the girl which stole even upon their austere habits—a warmth of heart and generosity of feeling that no faults could check or conceal. She had a winning, soft and exceedingly arch manner peculiarly her own, which few could resist; a ready wit, and a laugh that rang through the heart like the tones of a silver bell, and which made the old deacon smile, even while he was lecturing her. Before Malina was eighteen she had good cause to congratulate herself that she was not a “church member,” for most assuredly would she have been ignominiously expelled had this been the case. At that season a sectarian feud had arisen between the Episcopal church and our old meeting-house, a difference of opinion which went well nigh to destroy all social intercourse in our village. The Episcopalians had offered a practical reproof to the upright manner in which the Presbyterians were in the habit of addressing the throne of grace, by erecting kneeling boards in the pews of their church, a course which led our minister into open denunciation of such heresy from the pulpit, where he eloquently defended his own manner of worship by a sermon containing manifold heads, and a prayer which was responded to by a congregation more resolutely upright both in body and mind than ever. This sermon of course was answered from the white church, with some spirit, and, in the midst of the controversy which arose, Malina Gray took it into her pretty head to exhibit a fashionable bonnet which she had purchased in New Haven, and a smart silk dress, in the Episcopal church, not only without asking her mother’s consent, but directly against her known wishes. It was even rumored that she did not rise, but absolutely bent forward and covered her pretty face with her pocket handkerchief, during the whole time of prayer, and that, on leaving the church, three persons had heard her say that she was delighted with the sermon, and particularly with the chant, it wassodroll. It was in vain that Malina defended her conduct, in vain she insisted that she had bent forward, and used her handkerchief only to conceal the motion of her lips as she ate half a dozen peppermint drops, and a head of green fennel which a companion had given her. She could not disprove her presence at the church, and that alone was considered as rank rebellion against her mother, and an insult to the congregation with which she had been taught to worship. Dark were the looks, and manifold the lectures which poor Malina was compelled to endure after this. When she entered the old meeting-house on the following sabbath every one looked coldly upon her. The minister even hinted at her delinquency in his prayers, and, during the sermon, two or three passages were applied directly to herself, by the steady and reproving glance which he fixed upon her from the pulpit. Now Malina was not of a temperament to bear all this patiently. She believed it intended to annoy and humble her. So, instead of receiving the chastisement with becoming humility, she arose from her seat, opened the pew door, in spite of her mother’s detaining hand, and hurried down the aisle, her eyes sparkling with tears, and her cheeks crimsoned with a degree of excitement which ill became the house of God.

To be perfectly aware of the enormity of Malina’s conduct, our reader must bring to mind the discipline of the times, and the rigid decorum exacted by the people in their places of worship, where nothing short of a fainting fit or a dispensation of apoplexy could excuse the interruption of a sermon. Never was a body of people so overwhelmed with astonishment and dismay. The widow arose from her seat pale with resentment, for it was by her private request that the minister had pointed out the spirited girl as a transgressor before the congregation—she half opened the pew door, paused a moment and sat down again, with her lips firmly compressed, and a spirit burning in her dark eyes, which in another might have been thought as much to be condemned as that of her child. Phebe, the mild and gentle Phebe, blushed crimson with a feeling of sympathy for her sister, which could not, with all her meekness of disposition, be entirely suppressed. When the glow died away from her cheeks she was in tears and wept silently till the service closed.

When Mrs. Gray reached home that afternoon, sternly ruminating on the best means of conquering the refractory spirit of her child, she found the house locked, and the rooms empty as she had left them. Malina was no where to be found. It was in vain that Phebe searched for the culprit. She went to their mutual sleeping-chamber, hoping to find her there, but all was silent. She lifted the muslin drapery that fell over the bed like a summer cloud, put her hand through the open sash and parting the thick green leaves of a cinnamon rose tree that half darkened it, looked anxiously up and down the road, and along the footpath which threaded the river’s brink. But the waters gliding quietly by, and a fish-hawk soaring up from the shore just below the bridge, with an unfortunate perch in his claws, alone rewarded her gaze. Still she leaned from the window, apprehensive on her sister’s account, but afraid to extend her search beyond the house, for never in the whole course of her life had Mrs. Gray permitted her children to walk even in the garden on a sabbath day; a walk to and from the old meeting-house morning and evening was all the exercise that she had allowed them. Phebe felt as if almost transgressing a domestic rule even while she lingered with her head out of the window, and when the chamber door opened she started back like a guilty thing, and with a violence that sent a shower of pink leaves half over the room, from the full blown roses which fell rustling together from her hands.

Mrs. Gray entered the chamber quietly, but a little paler than usual, and with her lips still slightly compressed. She evidently expected to find the culprit there, but when she saw only her elder daughter standing by the window, in tears and with a look of trouble on her sweet face, her own composure seemed a little shaken, still she did not speak, but going up to the toilet took a pocket bible from its snowy cover, and dusting away the rose leaves that had fallen there with her handkerchief, was about to leave the room again. As she passed through the door, Phebe found courage to follow her.

“Oh, mother,” she said, “what can have become of her? Where can she be? Let me go and look.”

“It is the sabbath,” said Mrs. Gray, in her usual slow, mild voice.

“I know it is, mother,” replied the weeping girl, “but when a lamb strays from the flock can there be wrong in bringing it home again, even on the sabbath?”

“You may search for your sister in the garden,” was the reply, “and when she is found bring her to the parlor. Our minister will be there, and if she does not beg his pardon for her flagrant conduct, even on her knees if he desires it, she is henceforth no child of mine!”

“Oh, mother, do not urge her to-night. You know how high spirited and resolute she is—and, indeed, indeed, I must think they have been too hard with her—it was cruel to expose her fault before the whole village, her schoolmates and all, and she so proud and sensitive. I wonder it didn’t kill her.”

“Have you also become rebellious?” said Mrs. Gray, turning her eyes with steady disapproval on the agitated girl, and marveling within herself at the burst of feeling which she evinced.

“You will never, I trust, find me rebellious,” replied Phebe meekly, but weeping all the time. “I know that Malina has faults; who has not? but they are such as harsh treatment will perpetuate, not conquer. She is so kind, so warm-hearted, that you can persuade her to any thing.”

“I do not choose topersuademy children,” said the mother, moving forward. “Go seek Malina in the garden, and bring her to me as I desired.”

“But I fear that she is not in the garden,” said Phebe, doubtingly.

“Then seek her elsewhere, but return soon,” was Mrs. Gray’s reply, and she went down stairs just as Phebe heard the minister knocking at the front door.

Phebe tied on her cottage bonnet, and flinging a scarf over her white dress went into the garden. She traversed the flower-beds, searched among the rose thickets, and the lilac trees, calling Malina by name, but all without effect. More than once, when a rustling among the bushes, created by a tame rabbit, reached her ear, she started and listened with an expectation that her call would be answered. After searching through the garden and around the rock spring—a fountain of water that leaped through a hollow at the foot of the hill into a natural basin of solid granite—we saw her come out into the road and look anxiously toward the pine grove on our side of the river, with her hand shading her eyes and her scarf fluttering in the breeze.

As our cottage stood on neutral ground, between the two sections of the village, so our family was perhaps the only one within three miles which did not take part in the religious controversy going on. It was our usual custom to worship in the old meeting-house in the morning, and in the afternoon attend service in the Episcopal church. This habit left us ignorant of what had been passing on School-hill, and when we saw Phebe Gray out in the open street that sabbath evening, we felt that something unusual must have occurred. She remained, as I have described, with a hand shading her eyes for more than a minute, and then hurried down the road toward the bridge at a quicker pace than we had ever seen her walk before. After crossing the bridge, she paused a moment on seeing our family sitting at the door—some of us on the steps and others reading on the greensward in which they were bedded—as if prompted to come toward us, but changing her mind she followed the road a few steps and then turned into the pine grove, through a footpath which led along that portion which skirted the river. After a little time she came in sight again, retracing her steps with another person whom we recognized as Malina. Their progress was very slow, Phebe’s arm was around her sister’s waist, and she seemed to be talking with great earnestness. When they came opposite our house we could see Malina’s face, though after the first glance toward us she turned it away, as if ashamed of the tears which stained her cheeks. Her dress was disordered and a little soiled by the moss on which she had evidently flung herself; her gipsy hat was blown on one side, exposing a profusion of brown ringlets slightly disheveled, and out of curl enough to make them fall more profusely than usual over her neck and shoulders. She walked with an impatient step, and seemed a little restless under the restraint of her sister’s arm, but when they got within the shadow of the chesnuts, and as they supposed beyond our observation, we saw her pause all of a sudden, fling her arms round Phebe’s neck and kiss her more than once with a degree of affection which spoke volumes in her favor. After this she arranged the hat on her head with considerable care and allowed the folds of her disordered dress to be smoothed. Then with another kiss the two girls crossed the bridge, each with her arm circling the other, and in this position they walked up the hill and disappeared in the portico of their own dwelling.

The two girls entered the family parlor; Malina with her cheek flushed once more and a step tremulous but haughty. Poor Phebe clung to her side, looking frightened and much more like a culprit than her sister. Mrs. Gray was seated at a table looking cold, precise and courteous as if nothing had happened; her black silk dress was arranged with that scrupulous care which she always bestowed on her raiment. Her false curls were carefully fastened beneath the slate-colored ribands and the fine lace border of her cap, while a muslin neckerchief was folded on her bosom, beneath the dress, sufficiently low to reveal a neck that had not yet lost all its whiteness, and a string of large gold beads which encircled it. The family bible lay open before her, but she was not reading, for in an easy chair close by sat the minister. He had been pastor at School-hill for more than twenty years, was naturally a kind man, but believed the well-being of his congregation to be identified with certain doctrinal points, which to dispute was rank heresy. He looked very grave when the girls entered, and rather restless, as if the duty which brought him there was one which his naturally kind heart would have avoided.

“Phebe, you may go to your chamber,” said Mrs. Gray to her eldest daughter, who had followed Malina to a chintz sofa and was about to sit down by her side.

Phebe hesitated and looked toward her mother, as if anxious to remain; but as she parted her lips to speak, a more decided command sent her weeping from the room.

[To be continued.

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