Various

BY G. P. R. JAMES.

BY J. G. WHITTIER.

BY MISS PARDOE.

"GRAHAM" TO "JEREMY SHORT."

GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE
1849.
DAY ON THE MOUNTAINS.
Drawn & Engraved by W. E. Tucker

GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE.

Vol. XXXIV.      January, 1849.      No. 1.

Transcriber’s Notes can be found at the end of this eBook.

POETRY.

MUSIC.

ENGRAVINGS.

But in a secular magazine there must be light reading—all, or nearly all, the contents must be of a kind addressed to the fancy as well as the understanding—and consequently of a character to excite the censure, or at least forbid the approach, of the ascetic. Nay, it must greatly differ from the class of periodical literature devoted to, and sustained upon sectarian religious grounds. The task, the labor of the magazine editor is to sustain the high moral tone of his work, and yet have it the vehicle of fashion, taste and the arts—to take the pure, the good, and the beneficial, and give to them attractions for the young and gay—or, to take that which is attractive for the young and the gay, and make it the vehicle of high moral truth—of sober, solid reflection, the means of heart-improvement, and the promoter of home joys—to overlay the book with gold, and with sculptured cherubim, and all the magnificence of taste and ingenuity—but to be sure that within are the prophet’s rod—the shew-bread of the altar—and the written law of truth.

Our sense of the duty of a magazine writer of the present time, is rather hinted at than set forth in the above remarks. The subject is one that might command the pages of a volume, and if properly handled would be made eminently useful to writers and to readers. Our attention was awakened to the subject by an examination of the exquisitely executed picture of “The Belle of the Opera,” with which that accomplished artist, W. E. Tucker, has enriched the present number of this Magazine. We do not know that he who drew the figure had such a thought in his head as the improvement of magazine literature; and it is probable that Tucker when he exhausted the powers of engraving, or almost all its powers, to produce the figure, was impressed rather with the importance of his contribution to the artistic importance of periodicals, than to the high moral influence which he was aiding to promote. But true genius, wherever exercised, is suggestive—and the beautifully drawn figure is as promotive of useful reflection as the best composed essay. Hence the fine arts and literature are allied—allied in their elevating influence upon the possessors, and their power of meliorating and improving the minds of the uninitiated. Hence they go hand in hand in the path of usefulness—hence they are united in this Magazine.

The Belle of the Opera! Will the reader turn back once more and look at the picture? How full of life—how much of thought—how self-possessed—how desirable for the possession of others—how conscious of charms—and yet how charmed with the tasteful objects represented.

The Belle of the Opera! To be that—to be “the observed of all observers,” in a house crowded with objects for observation, to be made preeminent by exceeding beauty is “no small thing.” It must be costly—it must demand large contributions from other portions of the possessor of the proud object. If acres went to enrich the dress of the ancient nobility of England, something as desirable and as essential to the possessor, as those acres were to the British nobility, must have been sacrificed to perfect the attractions of the Belle of the Opera. Were they social duties? were they domestic affections? were they the means of womanly usefulness? of healthful and almost holy operation upon the minds of others? were they prospective or present? is present moderate but growing happiness sacrificed, or is the present enjoyment of distinction so great as to balance all of immediate loss, and to make the sacrifice that of future peace, future happiness, future domestic usefulness, future social consequence, all that makes mature womanhood delightful, all that makes age respectable and lovely?

Such reflections and such pregnant queries arise in the mind, when we contemplate the representation of such loveliness, so displayed. (I might say such loveliness displayed, for the representation is loveliness itself.) And the moralist has taken just such a beauty, (if his mind ever “bodied forth” the forms of things so unknown,) and marked upon all the display “vanity and vexation of spirit”—the very display, and especially the place of the display, warranting the conclusion.

We confess that we have looked at The Belle of the Opera until our mind has arrived at other conclusions. We think it fair to conclude that so lovely a face, and such a majestic form, are at least prima faciÆ evidence of an elevated and beautiful mind, and that the enjoyment of opera music, nowhere to be enjoyed but at the opera, is by no means inconsistent with that elevation or that beauty. Music, that constitutes half our worship on earth, and all in heaven, shall that be regarded in itself as a sin or a means of degradation?

“But the display of the person, the vanity of the dress, the folly of the personal exhibition, these are against the character and usefulness of the Belle—”

How so? There is certainly no improper diminution of dress. The most that can be said is, that a beautiful woman, beautifully dressed, is sitting in the front seat of an opera-box, surrounded by hundreds of persons of both sexes, who have come with the same ostensible object, and who sit equally exposed.

But it is the exceeding beauty of the person and the elegance of the dress that make her conspicuous; and it is that conspicuousness which constitutes the ground of censure.

But fortunately The Belle of the Opera did not make herself beautiful. Those elegant proportions, those enticing charms, are the gift of Him who made human beings in his own image; and let it be confessed that half the elegance of the dress is attributable to the elegance of the form which it covers, and the exquisite beauty which it is not intended to conceal.

Beauty is a gift—a gift of God—like all personal or mental endowments, dangerous, it is confessed—but, like all, to be used for personal gratification and the promotion of social advantage.

If it is conceded to be a means of mental melioration to dwell among the beauties of artistic skill and lofty architectural efforts, then surely it must be still more advantageous to be reared within the influence of living charms; “to grow familiar day by day” with features and forms that constitute models for the representation of angels, and to pass onward through life with the sense of seeing constantly improved and gratified with objects of exquisite beauty exquisitely clothed. This is viewing The Belle of the Opera with an artist’s eye.

“But,” the moralist will say, “the high office of woman is vacated by such a sacrifice to display, and such a devotion of time to amusement. That The Belle of the Opera can never be The Bonne of the Nursery, and therefore woman is out of her place when out of such an exercise of her faculties as shall minister directly to domestic advantage.”

We take issue with the moralist on this question of the direct application of female faculties; and we do this because we feel that the narrow bigotry of the unenlightened, which leads them to condemn the elegant enjoyments of life, and to ground their condemnation on the demand which is constant upon human beings, “to do good and to communicate,” is founded on a want of a full appreciation of female powers, and a mistake as to what constitutes these, and their means of usefulness.

There will be no space for a discussion of the measure of female duties, though it is intended to enter upon such a discussion hereafter; but we may say that however extensive or however limited they may be, their discharge will be more or less effectual and complete, as she is qualified by the elegance of education, the improvement of her mind, the cultivation and adaptation of her faculties, to impart to others the graces of life, and to fix them by constant example.

Virtue is embraced for its charms—it is not admired for deformity or its negligence of mind; it has its attractions and its means of compensation, as much as has vice—but they are not always as obvious. The young must be made to trust in the results of a virtuous course; they must have their faith fixed by the graces of parental, of maternal precept and example—and this good cannot be hoped for if the mother is incapable of attracting, if she has not the means of charming—if, indeed, she cannot show that what constitute the pleasures of life (pleasures which in excess become crimes) are, while properly enjoyed, wholesome and advantageous, and at the same time can show the line of demarcation between their uses and their abuses. She must know what are the true accomplishments of life—she must understand the influence of refinement and cultivation on the mind—and she must bring herself to apply all these. She must know the difference, too, between the uses and the abuses of cultivated talents, and she must learn to discriminate.

She who would deny to the young the cultivation of talents, musical, literary or artistic, is like the beings who would pile up the snows of winter, that the accumulated heap might prevent the budding and the blossoming of spring; while she who would force the mind of her child to an unnatural development of merely ornamental faculties, is like one who would concentrate the rays of the sun through a burning-glass, in order to accelerate the growth of a delicate plant.

What we mean to assert is the obvious fact, that the female, the mother, cannot discharge the high responsibilities of her sex, without many of those acquisitions which are condemned as worthless in themselves, and perhaps the condemnation is in some measure correct; that is, the acquisition separately considered may be rather injurious than beneficial.

Music itself, if it be the only or the principal attainment of a woman, must be valuable only as a means of obtaining money or fame. So of dancing—so of painting—so of poetry, that divine gift—each one of these, allowed to become predominant, loses its meliorating influence, and devotes the possessor to a solitary enjoyment, or, at most, assists her in acquiring notoriety and a living.

It is our intention to laud the cultivation of tastes only as parts of the meliorating means of woman’s character—the acquisition or rather the improvement of ingredients to fit her for that office of delicate influence for which God evidently designed her. Her personal beauty may be a part of the means of her wholesome domestic influence—her love of, and attainments in, music, her improvement in drawing, her literary gifts and acquirements all go, when all are mingled, to give to her consequence and usefulness in the nursery, and to make her beloved and beneficially influential in the domestic circle, and to add attraction to her charms in social life. There is no incompatibility between all these acquisitions with great personal beauty, between a sense of that beauty, indeed, and the entire fulfillment of all domestic and social duties, that are likely to be devolved on one thus highly endowed, thus qualified by extensive attainments.

The Belle of the Opera is at a place of refined amusement, where the richest productions of musical science are properly delivered. She is dressed to suit her own means and the place which she occupies. There is as much propriety in the proper presentation of her charms, as in the appropriate delivery of the music. The place itself is one of enlarged social intercourse. Elegant attire is the requisite of the place, and is due from the female (who has it) to him who incurs the expense of the visitation, and receives the honor of her company.

“But she is admired in her display; her dress, her form, the beauty of her face, attract marked attention. She is the object of general observation.”

And why not? Is it inconsistent with good taste to admire beauty? Is not the whole opera a place where the taste is to be improved and gratified? Is it music alone that is to be relished? When went forth the decree from morals or religion that beauty—female beauty—should not be adorned? And to be adorned it must be seen.

Let us not hear the platitudes about the worthlessness of beauty; it is not worthless—it is of high price—of exceeding worth—of extensive usefulness; and, appropriately displayed, its influence is humanizing, tranquilizing, and every way beneficial.

To personal charms The Belle of the Opera adds a cultivated taste for music—a taste which she indulges at the fountain-head of such enjoyments. But does she less, on that account, or rather on these accounts, (beauty and musical taste, namely,) fulfill her mission at home? Does the lesson of virtue which the accomplished mother gives to her young child, fall less impressively on the heart because the infant pupil, in looking upward, gazes into a face replete with all of earthly beauty? Is there not a certain coincidence between the looks of his beloved teacher and the excellence of her delightful instruction? or rather, does not her beauty tend to make these lessons delightful? And if the charm for the child is the morning or evening hymn, does not the sacred simplicity of the text drop with extraordinary unction on the ear, if conveyed in the rich melody of a cultivated voice.

I might thus enumerate all the high attainments, and show how each becomes useful; but it is enough to have it understood, that the true, the great value of all these high gifts and extraordinary cultivation is derived from their influence, when combined, to form the character of the possessor. The Belle of the Opera is also The Belle of the Ball-room. The same variety of characteristics, without a necessity for the same attainment, marks each, and both are liable to be set down by a superficial observer, as destitute of any qualities, except those which distinguish them in the places of amusement.

May not the Belle of the Opera, or the Belle of the Ball-room, be the guardian genius of the sick chamber, the faithful, devoted director of the nursery?

I knew The Belle of the Opera, and she was as fond of the dance as of the song, and shared in both in the social circle, and enjoyed them in others in more public displays. Her buoyant spirits, her happy gayety of disposition, made her the marked object of admiration in all parties in which she shared—the first to propose that in which all could gracefully and appropriately join, and the last to propound a thought that could cast a gloom over the countenance of a single being around her. She seemed so much the spirit of the joyous assembly, that serious thought, deepth of feeling, or firm principles of good, were not suspected by those incapable of looking into the heart. The Belle of the Opera was deemed by such, one set apart for the enjoyment of the opera and the dance, and to be without life when without these means of life’s pleasures; to have no sympathy with her kind, excepting through music and display, and to reckon none among her intimates but the light-hearted and the gay.

Men may be thus exclusive, but women are not.

Returning one night from opera or route, the Belle entered her parlor wearied with, but not tired of the pleasure in which she had shared, when suddenly a cry of distress was heard; it was caused by the appearance of a case of small-pox in a neighboring house. At once the Belle changed her dress, and was at the bed of the sufferer.

“But, madam, have you had the small-pox?”

“No; but I have been vaccinated.”

“Ah! so was my sister.”

“But evidently not well. I will tarry and assist until she be removed, or some change take place.”

The change took place after a few days, and the Belle of the Opera carefully wrapped the body of the deceased in its grave-clothes, and having committed it to a coffin, she went to purify herself, give thanks for her preservation, and to enjoy again the fine arts which she so much admired.

The pleasant laugh could at times, and did, give place to tears of sorrow or of sympathy; and the appearance of indifference would promptly yield, when thoughtlessly or wickedly some sentiment opposed to strict morality, would drop from the lip of a companion. Never did hours of gayety tend to moments of unkindness, or the full enjoyment of the abundance to which all were happy to contribute, obliterate a sentiment of gratitude toward those whose earlier kindness might have assisted to prepare for that enjoyment.

Beneath the exterior of frequent devotion to admissible pleasure, there was a depth of feeling and a soundness of principle that sustained themselves in all circumstances, and exhibited themselves where-ever their exercise was requisite, that were seen, indeed, influencing even in the midst of gayety, and throwing a charm around that freedom of conversation in which those of well-regulated minds may indulge.

The virtues of The Belle of the Opera are not sudden, fitful, dependent upon excited feelings—they are constant, influencing, ruling. They appear in private conversations, they are manifest in delicate forbearance toward the errors of others, they exhibit themselves in unwavering attachment to known established principles, and a delicate tolerance of the views of friends; and they are set forth for admiration by the charms of those accomplishments which the world admires, and which that world supposes to be her principal attraction.

And that world judges in this case as in most others; it has no interest in the object before it, and it is not concerned to look into the effect of its own judgment upon that object. Ten thousand who saw the late laughter-moving Jefferson upon the stage, supposed that he never moved without laughing himself, and making others laugh. They supposed that he must delight in and be the delight of social life; and as they had nothing to do with his life off the stage, they never cared to correct their judgment—they never knew that the most pleasant of all comedians was fond of solitude, loved the quiet silence of angling—and was a prey to melancholy.

The inward man, the man to himself, the household man, the man of the fireside and social circle, is different from the man abroad, the man professionally, the man to others, and this not from hypocrisy, not from a difference of character throughout, but simply because the many who judge see only one phaze, and one, indeed, is all that is exhibited, all that is required to fill up the part in which the many know the man. But justly to judge, and fairly to decide, we must see the whole man, we must know how all his relations are sustained; we must see how he discharges the high, solemn duties of his life, and carries the influence of that discharge into minor relations. We must understand how much of himself, his better self, he gives to the amusements and light enjoyments of life, and how much he brings from them to influence his conduct elsewhere; or, if weak, how much of himself he leaves in scenes where artistic taste only is exercised; how much he sacrifices of himself to mere gratification—a burnt-offering never to be recalled.

And here we reach a point toward which we have attempted to steer; we mean the fullness of character, the entire inward person—the meeting—the combination—the fusion, indeed, of all those properties and qualities of the mind, by a well-directed education; the balancing of the various propensities and gifts by the skillful hand of instruction, so that no appetite, natural or acquired, shall have an undue predominancy, or serve to constitute the distinguishing characteristic of the possessor.

The Belle of the Opera, we have already said, brought to the place of amusements only the charms which God has bestowed and cultivated taste has well set off. She did not elect herself as The Belle of the Opera; she did not inaugurate herself as “the observed of all observers.” Such results, though made probable by the charms of her person, and promoted by the opportunities afforded by the indulgence of a high order of talents, was, nevertheless, the work of the admiring many, who felt and acknowledged the charms of person thus displayed, and at once rendered to them the kind of homage which their excellence and position seemed to suggest. They, the multitude, judged in part, judged by what they saw, and what they imagined—and deified the woman with the appellation of “Belle of the Opera;” it was all the attribute they had to bestow; they felt an influence that they did not comprehend; and not knowing of the charms concealed, that made effective what they saw, they gave to the visible and the ostensible, the regard which was only due to the concealed and the influencing, as the shepherds of old saw with admiration and delight the fiery part of the stars of the firmament in all their loveliness, and feeling an influence from the celestial display, adored the hosts of heaven for their beauty and their use, forgetful or ignorant of the power that made them seem beautiful—uninstructed in all the relations of those orbs by which their beauty and their usefulness are secured.

We have taken the reader to one scene, in which The Belle of the Opera showed how little the accomplishment of person, and the cultivation of taste had disturbed the feelings of humanity; and yet we confess, that such an example standing alone, seems to be a contradiction, or a sort of accidental effort, rather the result of impulse, rather dependent upon caprice or individual affection, than to be regarded as illustrative of, or consistent with, the ruling characteristics. We are speaking now of a whole character—and a character cannot be judged of by one strong propensity on one hand, and one great but contradictory act on the other.

Is the character of The Belle of the Opera complete? Is the distance between the lustre and display of the opera-box, and the devotion to the loathsomeness of the small-pox chamber, all occupied with corresponding virtues, and similar graces mingling, shading, combining, perfecting? If the great offices of the woman’s life, (we are speaking now of the Belle as a woman, looking at her higher vocation,) if all these offices are well discharged, if as mother, wife, as friend and neighbor, she stand unimpeachable; if she is as notable in all these relations as in the opera-box, still we want to inquire what is the influence exercised upon all these relations, by those qualities which made her The Belle of the Opera. How stand the opera-box and the nursery related? Because in the complete character of a woman are very few isolated qualities; they all bear upon each other, or exercise mutual influences, and each is less of itself by the qualities which it derives from others. The Belle of the Opera gave to her own fireside the attraction of her personal charms, if less gorgeously accompanied, still the more directly effective. The adventitious aid of ornaments, that was a sacrifice to public taste, was not required; and these charms gathered a circle which the exercise of mental accomplishments retained; and thus all within their influence derived the advantage which association with high gifts and large attainments necessarily impart, and the home was made gladsome by those charms which are attractive to their like, and compensating to their admirers.

The attainment of the science of music, and the display of that science at home, meliorated the manners of the inmates, and invited to association those whose taste was elevated, and whose talents were of a kind to sustain and appreciate high cultivation; and beyond the parlor these extended even to the nursery, or rather the nursery, by their exercise, was transferred to the parlor. That is what The Belle of the Opera understood by making all her accomplishments subservient to her duties as wife and mother. The mind of the child, by this constant intercourse with the gifted and the improved, became expanded, received character from the atmosphere in which it was placed, derived pleasure from the development which it witnessed, and had its habits formed to those graces which, in others, are only extraordinary results of extraordinary means, distinguishing the possessor only by one quality or attainment, making her The Belle of the Opera alone.

It is this association of the young with the beautiful and the accomplished, which infuses into their character, and fixes there those meliorating influences that constitute the charm of life, ruling, modifying, illustrating their whole character, making it whole, harmonious, consistent.

It must be understood that The Belle of the Opera was not a mere pianist, not a mere strummer upon the harp, she understood music as a science, and was therefore capable of conversing upon the subject as well as playing upon an instrument. This power of conversation, resting upon a deep knowledge of subjects, is the secret and charm of association; and it is worthy of remark, that gossip, even among the elevated, soon wearies; and what is more remarkable, it is wearisome and disgusting to children compelled to listen, while conversations or discussions upon subjects well understood by the interlocutors, are at once interesting to general listeners, and attractive, gratifying and instructive even to children. We appeal to general experience for this.

Eminently did The Belle of the Opera comprehend that truth, and practice upon it; hence a musical entertainment in her house was not a mere exercise of vocal powers, or a fearful attack upon the piano-keys. Music was discussed and then performed; and music, too, was not alone the theme. The well-lined walls denoted a taste for kindred arts; and the degrees of excellence of pictures, the distinguishing attributes of masters, were so lucidly illustrated, that the junior members of the family grew into connoisseurs without dreaming of study—grew directly and certainly into such characters without forethought, as a blade of corn, in all its greenness, is tending in the warmth of the sun, and the favor of the soil, to produce a golden harvest. But the discipline of mind necessary to acquire the advancement which The Belle of the Opera attained, gave to her habits of care with regard to the education of her children; and the superficial study which makes amateurs in any branch, was unknown in her family. Various degrees of perfection were observable, and in different branches of pursuits and studies there was a superiority among them, according to gifts; but compared with other families, these children evinced pre-eminence in almost every thing they undertook.

But it was as a wife that The Belle of the Opera most distinguished herself; we mean the special, particular duties of a woman to her husband—all the other qualifications to which we have referred, were of a kind to make her desirable as a wife—but in constant affection, manifested in various ways in those delicate arts, appreciable but inimitable by man, with which a beautiful and an accomplished woman makes attractive her home, preserves it at once from the restraints of affected knowledge, which is always chary of near display, because fearful of detection, and from that ostentatious exhibition of attainments which wearies and disgusts by obtrusiveness. In all these, and the graces of intimate and reciprocal affection, she made her husband proud of his home, happy in his companion, and gratified at her superiority in those things which belong more especially to her sex and made her beauty beautiful.

There was a cloud thrown suddenly across the brilliant prospects of the husband, a threatening of utter insolvency; the evil seemed inevitable. Who should tell The Belle of the Opera that the means of gratifying her highly cultivated taste, and displaying her admirable accomplishments were about to cease?

The husband had all faith in the affections of his wife; he appreciated the excellence of her character, for he was worthy of her. But it was a terrible blow to pride—to womanly pride—the pride of condition, which had never been straightened; it must be a terrible blow to her who knew how to use and how to give, but had never been called upon to suffer or acquire. He carried to her the fearful news of the anticipated disaster; he did not annoy her by the prelude of weeks of abstraction and painful melancholy, but with the first consciousness of danger he announced to her his fears, and awaited the consequences of the shock.

“And what, my dear husband, will become of us all—of you, of me, and of the children?”

“That is the misery of my situation. It is not only the loss of the property I received with you, and that which I had acquired, but it is the difficulty of pursuing any business without some of the means which I thought so safe. I know not now how to sustain my family even in the humble state which we must assume until I can again make a business. And you, with all your charms, with all your attainments, and all your power to enjoy, and means of affording pleasure—what a blow—what a fall!”

“And while you enumerate my attainments, do you forget that they are like yours, marketable; have you forgotten what that education cost? Will not others pay me as much for instruction as I have paid for my education? And will not the task of imparting be a pleasure rather than a pain, because it will be the exercise of those talents, and the uses of those attainments, whose employment has been the delight of our home, the pride of our social relations, and the solace of my solitary hours. Be assured, my dear husband, that with the exception of giving, most of the pleasures of wealth may be had in poverty—and the substitute for the pleasure of giving must be found in that of earning.”

The apprehended evil was never realized. The losses, though considerable, did not reach an amount that rendered necessary any diminution of style in the family.

“I think the alarm has not been uninstructive,” said The Belle of the Opera; “either that, or the approach of age,” (there was nothing in the lustre of her eye, or the brilliancy of her complexion that denoted the proximity of years—and she knew it when she said so—women seldom speak lightly of such foes when they are within hearing distance,) “either that or the approach of age has taught me to relish less many of the amusements which our means have allowed and with which my taste was gratified.”

“A natural gratification of so cultivated a taste,” said her husband, “could be nothing but correct; and it is only when others are acquired, that we need feel regret at indulging such as you have possessed. We, who approach the midsummer of life, find fewer flowers in our pathway than spring presented, but let us not complain of those who gather the vernal sweets; rather let us rejoice that we take with us the freshness of appetites that delights in whatever the path of duty supplies, and by discipline are made to enjoy those latent sweets that escape the observation of the uncultivated.”

We repeat our remarks, that to judge of a woman we must know her whole character. We must not suppose because a lady is at the opera, that she has no pleasure in other positions, or that a cultivated taste for music is inconsistent with the general cultivation of her talents. It is wrong to imagine that a beautiful woman is necessarily vain, or that her beauty is inconsistent with the discharge of all the high and holy duties that belong to her sex; the wife, the daughter, the mother, and the friend.

Excessive amusement, we know, vitiates the mind; and a woman, whose whole pride is to be The Belle of the Opera, has evidently no mission for domestic usefulness. But the domestic circle is blessed, and woman’s office honored, when an improved taste and generally cultivated talent, the charms of person and elegance of manners are made subservient to, and promotive of, the full discharge of the duties that belong to woman in her exalted sphere.

And, we may add, that religion itself is made more lovely, more operative, when the offices of humanity which it suggests, and the services of devotion by which it is manifested, are discharged by one who brings to the altar talent, beauty, acquirements, with a sense of their unworthiness, and takes thence a spirit of piety and devotion that throws a charm about all the graces that have been so attractive to the world.

We would have our Magazine commend to our fair readers for approval and acquisition, all the gifts and graces which belonged to The Belle of the Opera; we would not have them seek that title. She did not; as unconscious of the admiration of the audience, as the performers were of her individual presence; she came to enjoy the music, not to acquire fame. We would have those for whom we write bear in mind that the character of woman is incomplete, whatever talents or acquisition she may boast, if she has not the charm that attracts to and delights its domestic circle. And she should know that the basis of all those charms which give permanent beneficial influence, is religion; a fixed principle of doing right, from right motives. Upon that basis let the lovely fabric be erected; beauty, music, literature, science, social enjoyment, all become and all ornament the structure. And woman’s character with these is complete, if she add the discharge of the duties of a friend—a wife—a mother. She who is the charm of social life must be the benignant spirit of home—the source and centre of domestic affection.

———

BY AUGUSTA.

———

In character my kinsman is somewhat passionate and self-willed, but generous, warm-hearted, faithful and thoroughly honorable. Yet, though a person of undoubted talent, even genius, I do not think he will ever be a distinguished man; for he sadly lacks ambition and concentration, that fiery energy and plodding patience which alone can insure success in any great undertaking. He has talent for painting, music and poetry, but his devotion to these is most spasmodic and irregular. He has quite a gift for politics, and can be eloquent on occasion, yet would scarcely give a dead partridge for the proudest civic wreath ever twined. As a sportsman, my cousin has long been renowned; he has a wild, insatiable passion for hunting, is the best shot in all the country round, and rare good luck seems to attend him in all his sporting expeditions.

For the rest, he is a graceful dancer, a superb singer, and a finished horseman; so, on the whole, I think he will answer for a hero, though the farthest in the world from a Pelham, a Eugene Aram, a Bruno Mansfield, or an Edward Rochester.

“In the course of human events,” it chanced that a year or two since, I received an urgent invitation from my relatives, the Groves, to spend the early autumn months at their home, in the interior of one of our western states. Now for my diplomatic address; I wrote, accepting, with a stipulation that the name of my well-beloved friend, Miss Catharine Richmond, who was then visiting me, should be included in the invitation, which, in the next communication from the other party, was done to my entire satisfaction. Kate gave a joyful consent to my pleasant plan, and all was well.

One fine afternoon, in the last of August, saw the stage-coach which conveyed us girls and our fortunes rolling through the principal street of W——, the county-seat, and a place of considerable importance—to its inhabitants. We found my uncle, the colonel, waiting our arrival at the hotel, with his barouche, in which he soon seated us, and drove rapidly toward his residence, which was about two miles out of town. On the way, he told me I would meet but two of his seven sons at home—Harry, and an elder brother, on whom, for a certain authoritative dignity, we had long before bestowed the sobriquet of “the governor.” He also informed us that his “little farm,” consisted of about eight hundred acres, and that the place was called “Elm Creek.”

As we drove up the long avenue which led to the fine, large mansion of my friends, I saw that my good aunt and Cousin Alice had taken steps to give us an early welcome. I leaped from the barouche into their arms, forgetting Kate, for a moment, in the excitement of this joyful reunion.

But my friend was received with affectionate cordiality, and felt at home almost before she had crossed the threshold of that most hospitable house. My grave cousin, Edward, met us in the hall—bowed profoundly to Kate, and gave me a greeting more courtly than cousinly; but that was “Ned’s way.” Harry was out hunting, Alice said, but would probably be home soon.

After tea, we all took a stroll through the grounds. These are very extensive, and the many beautiful trees and the domesticated deer, bounding about, or stretched upon the turf, give the place a park-like and aristocratic appearance. Elm Creek, which runs near the house, is a clear and sparkling stream, which would be pleasantly suggestive of trout on the other side of the Alleghanies.

Suddenly was heard the near report of a gun, and the next moment Harry appeared on the light bridge which spanned the creek, accompanied by his faithful Bruno, a splendid black setter. On recognizing me, he (Harry, I mean, not the dog) sprung forward with a joyous laugh, and met me with a right cousinly greeting. I never had seen him looking so finely—he had taste in his hunting-dress, which became him greatly; and it was with a flush of pride that I turned and presented him to Kate. Harry gave her a cordial hand-shake, and immediately after, his dog, Bruno, gravely offered her his sable paw, to the no small amusement of the company.

I soon had the satisfaction of seeing that there was a fine prospect of Kate and my cousin being on the very best terms with each other, as they conversed much together during the evening, and seemed mutually pleased.

The next morning my gallant and still handsome uncle took us out to the stable and invited us to select our horses for riding. He knew me of old for an enthusiastic equestrian, and Kate’s attainments in the art of horsemanship were most remarkable. Kate chose a beautiful black mare, Joan, the mate of which, Saladin, a fiery-spirited creature, was Harry’s horse, and dear to him as his life. I made choice of a fine-looking but rather coltish gray, which I shall hold in everlasting remembrance, on account of a peculiar trot, which kept one somewhere between heaven and earth, like Mohammed’s coffin.

The fortnight succeeding our arrival at Elm Creek, was one of much gayety and excitement—we were thronged with visiters and deluged with the most cordial invitations. Ah! western people understand the science of hospitality, for their politeness is neither soulless nor conventional, but full of heartiness and truth. Long life to this noble characteristic of the generous west.

Colonel Grove was an admirable host—he exerted himself for our pleasure in a manner highly creditable to an elderly gentleman, somewhat inclined to indolence and corpulency. Every morning, when it was pleasant, he drove us out in his barouche, and by the information which he gave, his fine taste for the picturesque, and the dry humor and genuine good nature of his conversation, contributed much to our enjoyment. In the sunny afternoons, we usually scoured the country on horseback—Harry always rode with Kate and I with “the governor,” who proved an interesting, though somewhat reserved companion. My Cousin Alice was unfortunately too much of an invalid for such exercises.

In our evenings we had music and dancing, and occasionally a quiet game of whist. Now and then we were wild and childish enough to amuse ourselves with such things as “Mr. Longfellow looking for his key-hole,” “Homeopathic-bleeding,” and the old stand-by, “Blind Man’s Buff.”

One rather chilly afternoon, about three weeks after our arrival, Alice Grove entered the chamber appropriated to Kate and myself, exclaiming, “Come, girls, put on some extra ‘fixings’ and come down, for you have a call from Miss Louisa Grant, the belle and beauty of W——, the fair lady we rally Harry so much about—you remember.”

We found Miss Grant dressed most expensively, but not decidedly À la mode, or with much reference to the day or season. She was surprisingly beautiful, however—a blonde, but with no high expression; and then she was sadly destitute of manner. She seemed in as much doubt whether to sit, or rise, nod or courtesy, as the celebrated Toots, on that delicate point of propriety whether to turn his wristbands up, or down; and like that rare young gentleman, compromised the matter.

Miss Louisa talked but little, and that in the merest commonplaces; she had a certain curl of the lip, and toss of the head, meant for queenly hauteur, but which only expressed pert superciliousness; so, undazzled by her dress and beauty, I soon sounded her depth and measured her entire circumference. But Kate, who is a mad worshiper of beauty, sat silent and abstracted, gazing on her face with undisguised admiration.

When the call was over, we accompanied our guest to the door, and while we stood saying a few more last words, Harry came up, having just returned from hunting. At sight of his fowling-piece, Miss Louisa uttered a pretty infantine shriek, and hid her eyes with her small, plump hands. Harry, taking no notice of this charming outbreak of feminine timidity, greeted her with a frank, unembarrassed air, and throwing down his gun and game-bag, begged leave to attend her home. She assented with a blush and a simper, which left me in no doubt as to her sentiments toward my handsome cousin. Ah! how perilously beautiful she seemed to me then, while I watched her proud step as she walked slowly down the avenue, with a bitter feeling, for all the world as though I was jealous on my own account. I was somewhat pacified, however, by Harry’s returning soon, and bringing Kate a bouquet from Louisa’s fine garden.

That evening we were honored by another call extraordinary, from a young merchant of the place—the village D’Orsay—by name, La Fayette Fogg, from which honorable appellation the gentleman, by the advice of friends, had lately dropped the “Marquis”—his parents, at his christening, having been disposed to go the whole figure. But he had a title which in our “sogering” republic would more than compensate for any of the mere accidental honors of rank—he had recently been appointed captain of a company of horse, in W——, and had already acquired a military bearing, which could not fail to impress the vulgar. A certain way he had of stepping and wheeling to the right and left, suggestive at once of both a proud steed and a firm rider—a sort of drawing-room centaur. But Captain Fogg was beyond all question strikingly handsome. I never saw so perfect a Grecian head on American shoulders. There was the low, broad forehead, the close, curling hair, the nose and brow in one beautiful, continuous line, the short upper lip, round chin, small ears, and thin nostrils. A classical costume would have made him quite statuesque; but, alas! he was dressed in the dandiacal extreme of modern fashion. His entire suit of superfine material, fitted to an exquisite nicety, and he revealed a consciousness of the fact more Toots-ish than Themistoclesian. He moved his Phidian head with slow dignity, so as not to disturb his pet curls, slumbering in all the softness of genuine Macassar. His whiskers and imperial were alarmingly pale and thin, but seemed making the most of themselves, in return for the captain’s untiring devotion and prayerful solicitude.

The expression of this hero’s face, malgrÉ a Napoleonic frown which he was cultivating, and a Washingtonish compression of the lips, was soft, rather than stern—decidedly soft, I should say,—and there was about him a tender verdancy, an innocent ignorance of the world—all in despite of his best friends, the tailor, the artist in hair, and the artist in boots.

During the first half hour’s conversation, I set the gallant captain down as uneducated, vain and supercilious; but I was vexed to see that Kate, dazzled by his beauty, regarded him more complacently. It was evident from the first, that Kate pleased him decidedly, and he “spread himself,” to use a westernism, to make an impression on her heart, whose admiration for his physique spoke too plainly through her eyes. While he talked, Kate watched the play of his finely chiseled lips, and when he was silent, studied with the eye of an artist, the classic line of his nose. The attentive, upward look of her large, dark eyes, was most dangerous flattery—it loosened the tongue of our guest marvelously, till he talked quite freely, almost confidentially. Among other things, he informed us that he “was born in the chivalrous south,” and had been “a native of W—— for only the five years past.” I glanced mischievously at Kate, and she, to turn the tide of talk, exclaimed—“Oh, Mr. Fogg, we had a call from Miss Grant to-day! Exquisitively beautiful—is she not?”

“Why,” drawled the captain, stroking his imperial affectionately, “she is rather pretty, but wants cultivation; I can’t say I admire her greatly, though she is called the Adonis of this country.”

Kate colored with suppressed laughter, bit her lip, and rising, opened the piano, saying—“Do you sing, Mr. Fogg?”

Fortunately, Mr. Fogg did sing, and that very well. He declined accompanying Kate in “Lucy Neal,” saying that he “never learned them low things;” but on many of Russell’s songs he was “some,” and acquitted himself with much credit.

During all this time Harry had taken little part in the conversation, and when asked to sing, drily declined. I thought him jealous, and was not sorry to think so. I saw that Kate also perceived his altered mood, yet she showed, I regret to say, no Christian sympathy for his uneasiness, but chatted gayly, sung and played for all the world as though earth held neither aching hearts nor dissatisfied Harrys.

At last my cousin rose hastily and left the room. I said to myself, “He has gone out to cool his burning brow in the night air, and seek peace under the serene influences of the stars.” But no, he crossed the hall, and entered the family sitting-room. Soon after I followed, and found him having a regular rough and tumble with Bruno, on the floor. He raised his head as I entered, and said with a yawn,

“Has that bore taken himself off?”

“No,” I replied.

“Well, why the deuce don’t he go—who wants his company?”

“I don’t know,” said I, “Kate, perhaps.”

“Very likely,” growled Harry, “you intellectual women always prefer a brainless coxcomb to a sensible man.”

“Yes, Cousin Harry, in return for the preference you men of genius give to pretty simpletons.”

The captain’s “smitation,” as we called it, seemed a real one, and his sudden flame genuine—at least there was some fire, as well as a great deal of smoke. He laid resolute siege to Kate’s heart, till his lover-like attentions and the manifestations of his preference were almost overwhelming. In a week or two Kate grew wearied to death of her conquest, and was not backward in showing her contemptuous indifference, when Harry Grove was not by. But, oh, the perverseness of woman! in the presence of my cousin, she was all smiles and condescension to his rival; and he, annoyed more than he would confess, would turn to Miss Louisa Grant with renewed devotion.

Yes, Harry was plainly ill at ease to mark another’s attentions pleasantly received by my friend—that was something gained; but such jealousy of a mere tailor-shop-window-man, was unworthy my cousin, as well as a wrong to Kate; and for my part, I would not stoop to combat it.

In the captain’s absence, however, all went admirably. Harry seemed to give himself up to the enjoyment of Kate’s brilliant society, her cleverness, her liveliness, her “infinite variety,” with joyous abandon. They sung, read, danced, strolled, and rode together, always preserving the utmost harmony and good-will.

For Kate’s success in the part I wished her to play, I had never any fear. Aside from her beauty, which is undeniable, though on the brunette order, and her accomplishments, which are many, she has a certain indescribable attractiveness of manner, an earnest, appealing, endearing way—a “je-ne-sais-quoi-sity,” as a witty friend named it, which would be coquetry, were it not felt by all alike, men, women, and children, who find themselves in her presence. It is without effort, a perfectly unconscious power, I am sure.

Thus, I did not fear for Kate, provided Harry was heart-whole; but this fact I could not settle to my entire satisfaction. My Cousin Alice sometimes joked him about a certain fair maid he had known at New Haven, while in college, evidently wishing it to appear that she knew vastly more than she chose to reveal; and then Miss Grant was certainly a dangerous rival—far more beautiful, according to the common acceptation of the term, than my friend, with the advantage, if it be one, of a prior acquaintance.

One morning, as we were returning home, after having made a call on Miss Louisa, Harry, who once, for a wonder, was walking with me, began questioning me concerning my opinion of her. I evaded his question for awhile, but at length told him frankly that I could not speak freely and critically unless assured that I should give him no pain thereby.

“Oh, if that’s all,” replied Harry, with a laugh, “go on, and ‘free your mind, sister’—I shall be a most impartial auditor.”

“Indeed, Harry!—has there, then, been no meaning to your attentions in that quarter?”

“Why, as to that,” he replied, “I have always admired the girl’s beauty, and have flirted with her too much, perhaps, but there is not enough in her to pin a genuine love to; I have found her utterly characterless; and then, she affects a ridiculous fear of fire-arms, and behaves like a sick baby on horseback.”

“But, cousin,” I rejoined, “you do not want a wife to hunt with you, and ride horseback; Miss Grant is a young lady of domestic virtues and refined tastes—is she not?”

“Yes, and no. I believe she is a good housekeeper; she takes pains to let one know that—a perfect walking cookery-book; but for her refinement! Have you never noticed her coarse voice, and how much use she makes of provincialisms? She might sing well, but always makes mistakes in the words. She professes a passion for flowers; but last spring, coz, I helped her make her garden, and heard her say ‘piney’ and ‘layloc’—I never could marry a woman who said ‘piney’ and ‘layloc!’ and then she called pansies—‘pansies, that’s for thoughts’—those flowers steeped in poetry as in their own dew—‘Jonny-jump-ups!’ Bah! and then, she vulgarizes her own pretty name into Lo-izy!”

Need I confess that I was far from displeased with this little speech of my cousin’s. I was silent for a few moments, and then, with my head full of Kate and her fortunes, said, while pulling to pieces a wild-flower, which Harry had just gallantly presented to me,

“Well, then, cousin, you don’t love any body in particular, just now, do you?”

I raised my eyes when I had said this, to meet Harry’s fixed on my face, with a strange, indefinable expression—something of what is called a “killing look,” so full of intense meaning was it; but around his mouth lurked a quiet drollery, which betrayed him, even while he replied to my singular question in a tone meant to tell,

“Why, my dearest cousin, at this moment, I cannot say that I do not.”

I broke at once into a laugh of merry mockery, in which he joined at last, though not quite heartily; and we hastened to rejoin Ned, Kate and Alice, who were somewhat in advance.

On reaching our room I told Kate enough of my conversation with Harry to prove that he was really not the lover of Louisa Grant; and with a blush and a smile, she kissed and thanked me. Why should she thank me?

Thus matters went on—Captain Fogg’s star declining visibly, and Harry Grove’s evidently in the ascendant, until the last week of our stay, when a little incident occurred which had quite a disturbing influence on the pleasant current of my thoughts and Kate’s. One afternoon, while Harry was out shooting woodcock, of which Kate was very fond, on going up to my room, I perceived the door of Harry’s open, and saw his easil standing before the window, with a picture upon it. I could not resist the temptation of seeing what this might be, and entered the room. The picture was a small female head—the face rather fair, with dark blue eyes. It was probably a portrait, still unfinished. The likeness I did not recognize, though it looked like half a dozen pretty faces I had seen—Kate’s and Miss Grant’s among the number. To the bottom of the picture was attached a slip of paper, bearing these lines:

When I had read this verse, I remained standing before the picture in a thoughtful trance. I was finally startled by a deep sigh, and turning, saw Kate just behind me. She had also seen the portrait of the unknown, and read those passionate lines. She turned immediately and passed into her room.

When I rejoined her, a few moments after, she was reading, apparently deep in “Martin Chuzzlewit,” but tears were falling on the page before her.

“Martin’s return to his grandfather is a very affecting scene,” she observed.

I naturally glanced over her shoulder; the book was open at that “tempest-in-a-teapot” scene, the memorable misunderstanding between Sairey Gamp and Betsey Prig.

Oh, Kate, Kate! thy heart had gone many days’ journey into the life and fortunes of quite another than Martin.

In the evening Captain Fogg honored us, and Kate was unusually affable and gay. She sung none but comic songs, and her merry laugh rang out like a peal of bells.

During the evening we played a game of forfeits, and it was once adjudged that the captain should relate a story, to redeem his turquoise breastpin. He told a late dream, which was, that once, on taking a morning walk to hear the birds sing, he found Miss Richmond completely lost in a fog, and refused to help her out!

Oh, how he sparkled, as he fairly got off his witticism, and saw that it took!

“Ah, captain,” said I, “you must have a gift for punning.”

“Something of one, Miss,” he replied, with a complacent pull at his imperial. “I was into White’s, the other day, buying some music, and White offered me a song called ‘Mary’s Tears,’ which I told him must have a tremendous run! White laughed till he cried, and threatened to expose me in our paper! ’Pon honor, he did so!”

The captain informed us that the following would be a great day for the militia, as there was to be on the village-green of W——, a parade and review; and he gallantly begged the honor of our presence. We graciously testified our willingness to patronize the show, provided Harry would drive us into town for the purpose. On leaving, the captain requested the loan of Harry’s noble horse, Saladin, which had been trained to the field, for the grand occasion. He would come for him in the morning, he said. Harry consented, with rather a bad grace, I thought. He is a perfect Arab in his loving care for his horse.

The next morning, about ten, the captain called and found us all ready—the barouche waiting at the door. Colonel Grove, who is a gentleman of the ancien rÉgime, invited the young officer, who was in complete uniform, to take wine with him. It was really laughable—the captain’s affectation of a cool, bon-vivantish indifference, as he tossed off glass after glass of the sparkling champagne, showing himself to be far from familiar with that exhilarating and insidious beverage. He grew elevated momentarily; his very words soared majestically above mere common sense, and his eyes winked of strange mysteries, and flashed unutterable things.

At length were we civilians seated in the barouche and driving toward W——, at a brisk rate, the captain causing Saladin to wheel and caracole beside us in a most remarkable manner. Ah, how did the harmless lightning of his wit play around us! how were his compliments showered upon us like bonbons in carnival-time! How beautifully was he like the sparkling wine he had so lately quaffed—what was he but a human champagne-bottle, with the cork just drawn!

About half way to the village we saw before us an old Indian woman, well known in all the country round as a doctress, or witch, according to most people. She was bent almost double, and looked very feeble, though she was said to be still marvelously active and vigorous.

Suddenly the captain, who had galloped on a little to display his horsemanship, came dashing back, exclaiming—“Now, young ladies, for some glorious fun! Do you see that old squaw yonder?”

“Yes,” said Alice Grove, “that is old Martha—what of her?”

“Why, I mean to have some rare sport. I’ll invite her to take a ride behind me. I’ll ride up to the fence for her to get on, and then, just as she makes her spring, spur Saladin, and let her land on the ground.”

“Oh, don’t! don’t!” cried we all in chorus; but the captain was off and already speaking to old Martha. She evidently liked his proposition, for she quickly climbed the fence, preparatory to mounting. The captain wheeled his horse to within about two feet of her—she gave a spring—he spurred his steed, which leaped wildly forward—but too late! Old Martha was safe on Saladin’s back, her long, bony arms clasped closely round the waist of his rider—and, hurrah, they were off at a dashing rate.

Harry whipped up his grays, and we presently overtook the equestrians. Captain Fogg had succeeded in checking Saladin, and was striving to persuade old Martha to dismount, but in vain; she would ride to the village, as he had invited her. He coaxed, threatened, and swore—but all to no purpose; she would go on to the village!

At last, in endeavoring forcibly to unclasp her arms, Fogg dropped the rein, and Saladin, worried and frightened, started off at a furious gallop, and tore down the street like mad. Oh, the rich, indescribable ludicrousness of the sight! Such a conspicuous figure was the captain, so splendidly mounted, with “sword and pistols by his side,” and all his burnished buttons and buckles glistening in the morning sun; and then that ridiculous old woman, in her tattered Indian costume, seated behind him, clinging convulsively to his waist, and bounding up half a foot with every leap of the frantic steed. The ends of the captain’s scarlet sash floated back over her short black petticoat, and the white horse-hair of his military plume mingled ingloriously with her long elf-locks streaming in the wind.

The dirty woollen blanket of old Martha became loose, and flew backward, held only by one corner, exposing her bright blue short-gown, trimmed with wampum, while her red leggings got up quite a little show on their own account.

As thus they dashed on, faster and faster, they spread astonishment and consternation as they went.

A farmer, who with his son was gathering apples from a tree near the road, saw the vision—dropped his basket, and knocked down his first born with an avalanche of pippins. An old lady, who was hanging out clothes in her yard, struck with sudden fright and sore dismay, fell backward into her clothes-basket, as white as a sheet, and as limp as a wet towel.

Young urchins let go the strings of kites, leaving them to whirl dizzily and dive earthward—left “terrestrial pies” unfinished, and took to their heels! A red-haired damsel who was milking by the road-side, on beholding the dread apparition, turned pale, and ran, and the cow, following her example, also turned pail and ran!

But most excruciatingly and transcendentally ridiculous was the scene when Saladin, over whom the captain had lost all control, reached the parade-ground, and dashed in among the soldiers and spectators. Hats were tossed into the air, and shouts of laughter and derisive hooras resounded on every side. But fortunately for poor Fogg, Saladin suddenly perceived a part of the cavalry company, who, in the absence of their captain, were going through some informal and supererogatory exercises, and obedient to his military training, wheeled into line, and stood still, with head erect and nostrils distended.

“For Heaven’s sake, boys,” cried the captain, “haul off this old savage!”

But the worthy Martha, wisely declining such rough treatment, leaped to the ground like a cat—made a profound courtesy, and with a smile rather too sarcastic for so venerable a person, said,

“Me tank you, cap’en—old Martha no often have such fine ride, with such pretty man, all in regiments!”

After this rare comedy, the review was a matter of little moment, and we soon returned home, not even waiting for the tragedy of the sham-fight.

On the afternoon of the following day, Harry invited Kate to take a horse-back ride—and the incidents of that ride, as I received them from my friend, I will relate to the best of my ability.

The equestrians took a route which was a favorite with both—up a glen, wild and unfrequented, through which ran a clear, silver stream. It happened that Harry was in one of his lawless, bantering moods, and teazed Kate unmercifully on the gallant part played by her lover, the captain, on the preceding day.

Kate, who was not in the most sunny humor, began to rally him about “Lo-izy” Grant, and the New Haven belle.

Suddenly Harry became grave, and said, in an earnest tone, “Shall I tell you, Kate, just the state of my heart?”

“Don’t trouble yourself,” she coolly replied, “it is a matter of no moment to me.”

“There, now, you are insincere,” said Harry, with a saucy smile, leaning forward to strike a fly from Saladin’s neck, “it is a matter of some moment to you, for you know that I love you, and that you are not entirely indifferent to my love.”

“Sir, you mistake in addressing such language to me—you are presuming,” said Kate, with a petrifying hauteur; and giving her horse a smart cut with the whip, galloped on. Surprised, and somewhat angry, Harry checked his own horse, and gazed after her till she was lost in a bend of the winding road. As he stood by the side of the rivulet, Saladin reached down his head to drink. In his troubled abstraction, Harry let go the rein, which fell over the head of his horse. With a muttered something, which was not a benediction, Harry dismounted to regain it, when Saladin, in one of his mad freaks, gave a quick leap away and galloped up the glen after his mate. Harry was about to follow, but an odd thought coming into his brain, he threw himself on the turf instead, and lay perfectly still, with closed eyes, listening to the gallop of the two steeds, far up the glen. Presently he heard them stop—then turn, and come dashing down again with redoubled speed. Nearer and nearer came Kate. She was at his side—with a cry of alarm she threw herself from her horse and bent above him.

“Harry, dear Harry, were you thrown—are you injured?” she cried, raising the head of the apparently unconscious man, and supporting it on her knee. “Oh, Heaven! he is hurt—he does not hear me!” she murmured, laying back the hair from his forehead and pressing her lips upon it wildly and repeatedly. Harry’s eye-lids remained hermetically sealed, but a queer, comical expression began to play around the corners of his mouth, and was about to betray him, when he suddenly opened his eyes, with a look of triumphant impudence, and broke into a peal of joyous laughter.

Kate dropped his head with a movement of indignation and dismay—sprung up—led her horse to the trunk of a fallen tree, just by, from which she leaped into her saddle, and was off almost as soon as Harry had regained his feet. Again the faithless Saladin left his master in the lurch, and followed Kate, who went at a furious rate, never pausing nor looking back; so the somewhat discomforted Harry was obliged to foot it home, a matter of “twa mile and a bittock,” as they say in Scotland.

That night Kate had a headache, and did not appear at the tea-table, nor join the evening circle, where poor Harry was cross-questioned without mercy on the strange circumstance of having been left behind both by his horse and lady-fair.

“Ah, Kate,” said I, as I joined her at the close of the evening, “I have something to tell you. While you were dressing for your ride to-day, Harry called me into his room to show me that picture—and will you believe, it is only a bad portrait of yourself! Harry sketched it long ago for Louisa Grant, but has lately been making some important alterations, and now he thinks it strikingly like you. I really wonder we did not see the resemblance; the poetry was meant for you alone.”

“Oh, Grace, Grace!” murmured Kate, in a bitter tone, “if you had only told me this before I went to ride!”

At breakfast, the next morning, there was no Harry—two hours before he had whistled his dog and shouldered his gun, and set out on a crusade in turkey-land. But long before noon the young hunter returned, and inquiring for Kate, was directed to the library, where she sat, striving to drive away her sad mood, according to her own cheerful philosophy, by light reading. She had chosen “Hood’s Prose and Verse,” instead of Miss Landon’s Poems, which stood on the same shelf.

Again I must tell the story as it was told to me.

As Harry entered, Kate coloring deeply, started up—stood still a moment, and then sat down again, uttering not a word. Harry, seating himself near her, took off his hunting-cap, ran his fingers nervously through his hair, and in a tolerably steady voice began,

“I could have no peace, Miss Richmond, until I had begged your pardon for my unparalleled impertinence yesterday. I intreat you to believe that I had in my heart no intentional disrespect for you. I pray your forgiveness for my first rash words—what you called my presumption. For the other daring act, I am not so deeply repentant, for I would willingly have my head broken in reality, to have it lie for another moment where it laid yesterday; yet for that also I ask pardon. Do you grant it?”

“With all my heart,” said Kate, smiling; but Harry continued—

“I have been, indeed, most presuming and conceited, in supposing for a moment that I could be any thing to you; and, perhaps,” he continued, with a proud curl of the lip, “we have both been mistaken in according too much meaning to trifling words and acts—we two have flirted desperately, Kate,—have we not?”

Kate bit her lip in vexation, and a shade of disappointment passed over her face. Just then the eyes of the two met, for the first time for some minutes, and the ridiculousness, the utter absurdity of they two endeavoring to deceive one another—to conceal for a moment longer the blessed truth that they loved one another, broke upon them at once, and they burst into a long and merry laugh.

“Well,” said Harry, at last, dashing the tears of mirth from his flashing eyes, and seating himself nearer Kate, “it is time I at least was serious, for the deepest and strongest feelings of my heart will make themselves heard. Kate, dear Kate, whether it gives you pleasure to know it, or not, I must tell you how truly, how devotedly, and, though you will scarce believe that, how reverentially I love you! I am a strange, wild fellow, Kate, somewhat rude and over-mirthful; but you, I am sure, can make me what you wish. Will you undertake the task?”

“With all my heart,” she again replied, frankly extending her hand.

“Blessings on your sweet soul, Kate!—but—but—”

“But what, Harry?”

“Not much, only will you allow me to pay you back that small coin you bestowed on me yesterday, in your Christian charity?”

“Oh, I’ll forgive you the debt,” said Kate, laughing.

“No, dear, I’ll not take advantage of your generosity, but pay you to the uttermost farthing.”

“Ah, hold! that is all, now—a thousand times more than I gave you!”

Suddenly the happy lover darted out of the room, and presently returned, saying, “See, Kate! a portrait of you, from memory.”

“Ah, indeed!” said Kate. “But, Harry, you have made my dark hair quite an auburn, and it has only the slightest golden hue when the sunlight falls upon it.”

“Well,” he replied, “to my eyes, there was always sunlight playing around you.”

“Ah, thank you; but again, these eyes are dark blue, and mine are gray, or by complaisance, hazel.”

“A very natural mistake, dearest,” said Harry, with an arch smile, “I saw heaven in your eyes, and so came to paint them blue.”

“With a savage appearance, and manners, and customs, which are entirely barbarous, there is observable among them a social kindness, free from almost all the imperfections which so often disturb the peace of society among us. They appear to be without passion; but they do that in cold blood, and sometimes through principle, which the most violent and unbridled passion produces in those who give no ear to reason. They seem to lead the most wretched life in the world; and they were, perhaps, the only happy people on earth, before the knowledge of the objects which so much work upon and seduce us, had excited in them desires which ignorance kept in supineness, and which have not, as yet, made any great ravages among them. We discover in them a mixture of the fiercest and the most gentle manners; the imperfections of wild beasts, united with virtues and qualities of the mind and heart which do the greatest honor to human nature. One would think at first they had no form of government; that they acknowledge neither laws nor subordination; and that living in an entire independence, they suffer themselves to be solely guided by chance, and the wildest caprice. Nevertheless, they enjoy almost all the advantages that a well regulated authority can secure to the best governed nations. Born free and independent, they look with horror on the very shadow of despotic power; but they seldom depart from certain principles and customs founded on good sense, which are to them instead of laws, and which in some measure supply the place of a lawful authority. They will not bear the least restraint; but reason alone keeps them in a kind of subordination, which, from being voluntary, it not less effectual to obtain the end intended.”^[1]

The Illinois has the same peculiarity I observed in all the rivers of the Mississippi valley. With the exception of here and there a solitary plantation, or a little embryo town, few traces of man appear on its borders until you arrive at the great prairie, above the head of steam navigation, which extends all the way to the lakes. At long distances we came upon one of those evidences of the busy body, man, in the shape of a little village, a clearing, or an establishment for putting up pork for exportation, where I was told, notwithstanding the “hard times,” they throw the ears, feet, and often heads of the swine into the river, to feed the eels and catfish. Indeed, from what I observed throughout the whole extent of my journey, in this suffering region, there is almost as much wasted there as would serve to feed the starving manufacturers of England.

Most of the towns on the river, below the Rapids, have little worthy of attention, and all their glories are prospective; but there is one it would be unpardonable to pass by without a tribute to its surpassing beauties. I refer to Peoria, whose aspect is as soft and gentle as its name. Father Charleroix, I think, calls it Pimitavery, and it lies on the left bank of the Illinois, where it expands into a lake from one to three miles wide, and ten in length. Ascending the bank, you come upon a fine prairie, forming a crescent, of some twelve or fifteen miles, judging by the eye, whose arch is bounded by a bluff, as it is here usually called, but which represents a natural terrace of wonderful regularity, clothed with luxuriant grass, and crowned with open woods, affording as beautiful sites for country residences as can be imagined in dreams. It was Sunday, and in the afternoon, when the sun was low, I took a walk from the town to the terrace, about a mile distant, which is reached by a private road, leading among wheat and corn fields of the greatest luxuriance.

Nothing could be more soft, calm, and alluring than the weather and the scene. The smooth glassy lake lay directly before me, bordered on the farther side by a vast green meadow receding far away, and fringed in the vague distance by a dark barrier of forest, beyond which was nothing but the skies. Between the lake and the terrace on which I stood, lay the thrifty, gay-looking town; to the left, the crescent gracefully curved till it met the lake, while to the right it made a noble sweep, enclosing a level prairie, whose extent I did not pretend to determine; and which, though it had never been sowed or reaped, looked as smooth as a shaven lawn, as green as the most luxuriant meadow. Neither fence nor inclosure of any kind was seen in that quarter, and the cattle dispersed about in all directions, strayed wherever they pleased. While contemplating the scene, the setting sun gradually retired behind the wooded terrace, and the glowing, golden lustre gave place to those transitions of the summer twilight which are so exquisitely touching and beautiful. There was a silence, a repose and loveliness all around, in the earth, in the heavens above, and on the waters, whose effect, if I could only communicate it to my readers, they would thank me for; and never did the sun set on a more holy Sabbath, or one better calculated to call forth grateful homage to the Creator of such an enchanting world.

This little paradise was until recently possessed by the Peoria Indians, a small tribe, which has since receded; and tradition says there was once a considerable settlement of the French on the spot. I was informed there is an extensive old burial-place, not of Indian origin, somewhere on or near the terrace, and noticed that not a few of the names and physiognomies in this quarter were evidently French. There seems a chasm in the forest history of this region, between the relation of Charleroix, which refers to no later period than 1720, and the final cession of the French North American possessions to the English. A series of obscure and unrecorded incidents which have escaped the historian, led to results which for this reason appear unaccountable; and there is, I think, every reason to believe all those discoveries of iron and copper implements, and other evidences of mechanical skill, from which some ingenious writers have inferred that the Indians once possessed arts they have now lost, may be traced to this period, and to adventurous white men, long since forgotten.

Some eight or ten miles above Peoria, just at the point where this charming lake again becomes metamorphosed into its parent river, and in the midst of a solitude which requires only the presence and labors of man to make it one of the gayest as well as most fruitful districts in the world, are the ruins, or rather remains of the modern city of Rome, founded, not built, in the palmy days of speculation wild. These remains consist of the skeleton of a single house, which puts the passing traveler in mind of the voice of one crying in the wilderness of rich, waving prairie, blooming with flowers of every hue and odor. If there is not a city here now, there certainly will be in time; and the long-sighted speculator, whoever he was, only anticipated a generation or two in the march of population. This beautiful region only wants inhabitants, which, whatever people may say, are necessary to the prosperity of cities; and I think it by no means improbable that some hundreds, or perhaps thousands of years hence—which, after all, is nothing compared to eternity—when all the past, present and future glories of the ancient mistress of the world are buried in the bottomless pit of oblivion, the founder of this legitimate successor, though not suckled by a wolf, may take rank with Romulus and Remus, and be immortalized as the parent of a new and more illustrious Rome.

Sailing up the river, among the green meadows, and willows kissing the surface of the waters, amid a silence broken only by the puffing of the steam-pipe, the next object which attracted my attention was a pretty little village pleasantly situated on the right bank, whose name commemorates the residence of old Father Hennepin, who, tradition says, once established a mission here. These early pioneers of the wilderness deserved and attained a great influence over the jealous, independent, impracticable red-man of the new world, and justly claim the respect of those who might never be incited to follow their example. They were unquestionably actuated by the purest, most elevated piety, in thus encountering and overcoming the dangers and privations of the untracked wilderness, and deserve to be respectfully remembered, if not for the success of their endeavors at least for the courage, zeal and perseverance with which they were prosecuted.

Among the earliest and most distinguished of these were Father Louis Hennepin and Joseph Marquette, the former of whom visited Canada somewhere about the year 1676. He remained some time at fort Frontenac, where he constructed a portable chapel, and whence he accompanied the celebrated Louis de La Salle, in a voyage of discovery on the Upper Mississippi, which had been discovered by Father Marquette, six years before. They visited the Falls of Niagara, of which he gives the earliest description on record. It is extremely accurate, as I ascertained by comparison on the spot, and shows what little change the incessant action of these mighty waters has produced in the lapse of almost two centuries. After establishing a post at Niagara, La Salle built the first schooner that ever sailed on the great lakes, and passing through Erie, St. Clair and Huron, entered Michigan, where he erected a fort at the mouth of the river St. Joseph. From thence they proceeded to explore the Mississippi, and it was probably on his return, that Father Hennepin erected his chapel on the spot where now stands the town bearing his name. According to his own account he first descended the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico, and returning, ascended that river as high as the Falls of St. Anthony, which are indebted to him for their name. He returned to France, published a relation of his discoveries, came back to this country, and I have not chanced to meet with any further account of him. Whether he ever visited France again, or whether he ended his days on the banks of the Illinois, I cannot say. I went on shore and visited the town, which stands on a high gravel bank—a great rarity in this region—and endeavored to ascertain the spot of the good father’s residence. But there are no aged persons, no depositories of traditionary lore to be found here; and our people are too much taken up with anticipations of the future, to pay much attention to the past. I found no one who could give any precise information, though all were familiar with his name. Hennepin is the county-seat of Putnam; and as it does not, I believe, aspire to the dignity of a great city, like most of its neighbors, will probably flourish long and happily, a memorial of the good father whose name it bears.

Father Joseph Marquette, whose name is also intimately associated with the early discoveries in this region, was a kindred spirit. According to Charleroix, who belonged to the same order of missionary knights errant, “he was a native of Laon, in Picardy, where his family still holds a distinguished rank. He was one of the most illustrious missionaries of new France; he traveled over almost all parts of it, and made many discoveries, the last of which was the Mississippi, which he entered with the Sieur Joliet, in 1673. Two years after this discovery, of which he published an account, as he was going from Chicagou, which is at the bottom of Lake Michigan, to Michilimackinac, he entered the river I am now speaking of, the mouth of which was at the extremity of the low land which, as I have said, we leave to the right in entering. He set up an altar here and said mass. After this he went a little distance to return thanks, and prayed the two men who managed his canoe, to leave him alone for half an hour. This time being expired, they went to seek him, and were greatly surprised to find him dead; but they recollected he said he should finish his journey there. As it was too far from thence to Michilimackinac to carry his body thither, they buried him pretty near the side of the river, which from that time has retired, as if out of respect, to the cape, at the foot of which it now runs, and where it has made a new passage. The year following, one of the men who had performed the last duties to this servant of God, returned to the place where he had buried him, took up his remains, and carried them to Michilimackinac. I could not learn, or else I have forgot, what name this river had before, but at present the savages always call it the river of the Black Gown. The French have given it the name of Father Marquette, and never fail to invoke him when they find themselves in any danger on Lake Michigan.”^[2] The little river still bears the name, and the spot where he was buried is designated on the maps as Marquette’s grave.

About the head of steam-navigation on the Illinois, and especially near the junction of the canal which will connect the lakes with the Mississippi, cities multiply prodigiously, and are called by the most prodigious names. Most assuredly my countrymen are great at christening places; but still I wish they would consult Tristram Shandy, where they will find a most edifying discussion on the subject. The race of antiquaries who grope their way backward through the obscure labyrinth of time by the clue of names, will assuredly be not a little puzzled, as children are wont to be, to find out who was the father of Zebedee’s children. If they should follow the etymology of names, they will probably come to the conclusion that we derived our parentage from all the nations of the earth, ancient and modern, and had more fathers than children.

Nevertheless I have nothing to say against any of the thriving brood of young cities that multiplied so wonderfully in those happy days when swallows built in young men’s whiskers, and the little hatchet became a great hammer before the iron grew cold. Those especially that have either houses or inhabitants, I wish all possible prosperity, and hope they will one day rival the great cities after which they are christened. But those which have nothing but a name and a lithographic map to demonstrate their existence, cannot expect to be recognized by any traveler of ordinary pretensions to veracity. The commencement of the canal to which allusion has just been made, was the signal for speculation in its immediate vicinity, and six cities were forthwith founded on the prairie between La Salle and Ottawa, a distance of some fourteen miles. As they may possibly perish in embryo before their birth, and thus dodge the antiquary who will be looking for them some centuries hence, I feel it a duty to do all I can to assist his inquiries, lest he should lose his wits in searching for them, as did the pedagogue in Le Sage, in looking for the paulo post futurum of a Greek verb.

The first of these, whose name I don’t choose to remember, is very advantageously situated on a barren rock, at the head of the navigation of a stream which can neither be spelt nor pronounced, and which had no water in it when I passed over. But not to wrong the river, or the long-headed, long-sighted founder of the city, I acknowledge I was informed that sometimes during the melting of the snows on the Rocky Mountains, or after a heavy shower of rain, there was an ample sufficiency of water to float a chip—not a ship, gentle reader—of considerable burthen, into the Illinois. It was therefore the opinion of the unknown and illustrious founder, that nothing could prevent this place from becoming in good time a great commercial emporium; and I was told, but will not vouch for the fact, that he had actually organized a whaling company, and seriously talked of opening a direct trade with China. In short, he looked forward with all the faith of a speculator, which exceeds that of a martyr ten times over, to seeing his city, in a few years, smothered by a corporation, blessed with half a dozen broken banks, and loaded with debts and taxes, in humble emulation of its betters.

In the books of English tenures, there are some whimsical conditions of ownership and occupancy; but I recollect none similar to the city I am commemorating, which denounces a forfeiture of property on all those convicted of either drinking or bringing spirituous liquors therein. No one will question the morality of this regulation, though its prudence may not be so obvious, as many people might suppose that any future purchasers of lots, some of which I was told had been originally sold for two or three hundred dollars each, would require some powerful stimulant in addition to the excitement of speculation. It is doubtful whether any sober man would give such a price at this time. I had almost forgot to mention that this city has neither houses nor inhabitants.

The next brevet city we passed, is just at the foot of the lower rapids of the Illinois, and directly on the margin of the river. It promises rather better than the other, having one house actually built, and another in anticipation. It is really a delightful spot, on a strip of prairie looking like an immense shaven lawn, backed by a high terrace of grassy knobs and precipitous rocks, whose sides and summits are clothed with foliage, along which the gentle river meanders lazily until it comes to the rapids, which, having passed, it pursues its way rejoicing. It might have destroyed the balance of this portion of the new world, had these two great marts been placed on the same side of the river, and accordingly they are prudently located on the opposite shores, in order to preserve the equilibrium. I was told there was a desperate rivalry between them, and great apprehensions are entertained from their competition when they come to be inhabited.

Just above this last-mentioned metropolis, and on the same side of the river, is the Starvation Rock, so called from a tradition, not very ancient, I believe, which tells that a large party of Illinois having sought refuge from the pursuit of a superior force of hostile Indians, were blockaded, and all, save one, perished by famine. This place was visited by Charleroix, in 1720, who ascended the rock, where he found the remains of old palisades, originally created for defence, and the bodies of two Indians, half consumed by fire. He says nothing, however, of the incident from which the place derives its present name. It is one of the most beautiful rocks I ever saw, exhibiting a succession of ledges, displayed horizontally with wonderful regularity, but of an infinite variety of shades and colors, such as is generally observed in cliffs of limestone. At a little distance, beheld through the soft hazy atmosphere of the prairie, it resembles the ruins of a great castle, towering to the height of perhaps two hundred feet, garnished with trees, shrubs, flowers and clambering vines. The whole of this vast fruitful region, from the delta of the Mississippi to the Niagara Ridge, terminating at Lewistown, is, so far as I observed, based on a limestone formation, and the waters every where impregnated with lime. They are said to be wholesome when one is accustomed to their use; but, unfortunately, I never could get used to them, and finally came to the conclusion, that—to vary the old proverb a little to suit the occasion—though Heaven had created the land, the D—l had furnished the water.

The last city I shall commemorate is called after a famous stronghold in Europe, being seated on a ledge of rocks extending from the Illinois into the prairie, and apparently inaccessible on all sides. It is certainly a capital position in a military point of view, and would be invaluable on a frontier. People might live there in great security if they could find any thing to eat. At present the only enemy they would have to fear is famine. Luckily, however, there are no inhabitants, and one need be under no apprehensions on that score. It is a most picturesque spot, the mossy rocks every where interspersed with flowers and verdure, and the summit crowned with an open wood of lofty trees, under which the grass is as green and luxuriant as a lowland meadow. There are several other cities, lying dormant, between this and the town of Ottawa, and no one can predict their future destinies. When the canal connecting the Mississippi and the lakes comes to be finished, as I hope it soon will be, for it is a great national undertaking, and will form the last link to the most extensive inland navigation in the world, there can be little doubt, I think, that this will become a very busy and populous region. Towns will rise up as a matter of course; and, provided they do not ruin each other by their numbers and their rivalry, will flourish to a considerable extent. Those, therefore, who have the wealth of Croesus, and the patience of Job, may, if they please, speculate in town-lots in these embryo cities, for the benefit of their posterity.

The gallant adventurer La Salle is worthily commemorated in this quarter, by a town and a county called after his name. Among all the hardy and daring pioneers, of the Mississippi valley and the lakes, he stands foremost, and best merits the remembrance and gratitude of the millions who are now enjoying the fruits of his enterprise and sufferings. He built the first vessel that ever floated on the lakes; he explored the Upper and Lower Mississippi, and perished at last by the hands of his companions, who finally shrunk from the perils and privations which he bore without flinching. Mr. Adams, when Secretary of State, in a correspondence with Don Leviz de Onis, the Spanish minister, on the subject of boundaries, pays a most eloquent, well deserved tribute to the genius, hardihood, courage and enterprise of Louis La Salle, but with this exception he has not met with that attention he so justly merits from my countrymen.

The little town of La Salle lies close to the junction of the canal with the Illinois, and was founded by a colony of the sons of old Erin, who were employed in that undertaking. It is a genuine, unadulterated Irish town; the cabins many of them of turf, and all thatched with straw. The number of pigs is only to be matched by that of children, and both are in a most flourishing condition, to judge from the portly dimensions of one and the rosy cheeks of the other. There is no place in the universe where the jolly, hard-working, warm-hearted Irishman can so gloriously luxuriate in the paradise of potatoes. The reader will please to understand that notwithstanding the number of great cities hereabouts, the entire prairie from Peru to Chicago, with here and there an occasional exception, is in a state of nature, although one of the fairest and richest portions of the earth. They began at the wrong end, or rather, they put the cart before the horse, and laid out towns instead of cultivating land. This is one of the prominent foibles of that sanguine, enterprising, anticipating and gallant race which is daily adventuring into the boundless region of the West. They are not content with land of inexhaustible fertility, but almost every tenth man aspires to be the founder of a city. Instead, therefore, of laying out his farm into fields, he lays it out into a town, which he calls after his own name, with a ville at the end of it; or he dams up the river, builds a mill, and lays the foundation of a series of bilious complaints, that descend to his posterity to the second or third generation. Hence the number of towns is out of all proportion to the number of inhabitants. With very many of them, their generation is a mere spasmodic effort of speculation. They consequently exhibit an appearance of prosperity for a few years; are then suddenly arrested, and either never grow any more, or dwindle away to nothing. A despotic monarch like Peter the Great may create a city where he will, but with all his power he cannot perpetuate its existence beyond his own, unless it possesses natural advantages to attract voluntary settlers. Private persons should beware how they undertake to found cities. They may build houses, but they cannot fill them with people.

The town of La Salle, unlike some of it neighbors, was conceived and brought forth in the natural way, that is, the people preceded the houses. When the honest Irish laborers came to work on the canal, they according to custom built themselves cabins, about the spot where they commenced their labors. As the land was neither cultivated nor enclosed, they employed their leisure hours in digging ditches about a piece of prairie large enough for a potato-patch, and sometimes a small patch of wheat or corn. Here, with little labor, they raised as much as supplied them with bread, or a substitute; and though the canal has for some years been discontinued for lack of means, these people continue to cultivate their little fields, which are wonderfully productive, frequently making new enclosures, and sometimes erecting frame houses. If the land belonged to the United States they were protected by the right of preemption, and if to a private citizen, it was his interest to let them alone, as there was no danger of the soil being exhausted, and he was thus saved the labor of the first ploughing, which is the most expensive of all the process of cultivation here. Thus these honest, laborious people live quite comfortably, waiting the period of recommencing the canal, and some of them perhaps able to purchase the land on which they reside, provided it is not laid out in cities, which is very probable, for you can hardly put down your foot without crushing one of these mushrooms.

Ottawa, like La Salle, is a real bona fide town, with houses and inhabitants. Its age is some twelve or fifteen years, and the number of its people from twelve to fifteen hundred. I found the situation so peculiarly agreeable, and the hotel so comfortable, that I determined to remain awhile, and amuse myself with making little excursions about the neighborhood, than which nothing can be more beautiful. The town stands at the junction of the Fox River with the Illinois. They are both clear, limpid streams, and though coming from far distant lands, meet and mingle together as quietly as if they had been friends from their birth. The scenery is as gentle as the rivers, and as mild and mellow as one of Claude’s pictures, that actually makes a real connoisseur yawn and stretch to look at it. In one direction the eye passes over a long narrow prairie, all one rich expanse of grass and flowers, through which the Illinois sometimes hurries rapidly over a ledge of rocks, at others meanders lazily along. On either side of the river, the prairie is bounded by those remarkable terraces which form one of the more beautiful features of this region. They rise abruptly from the green level sward, to the height, I should imagine, of one hundred and fifty feet, in some places presenting a smooth grassy bank, whose ascent is dotted and their summits crowned with trees; in others, walls of perpendicular rocks disposed in regular strata, of varied tints, diversified with all sorts of verdure peeping from out the crevices. These terraces seem created on purpose for houses, from the porches or windows of which the proprietors of the rich fields and meadows beneath, might overlook their beautiful possessions, and thank a bounteous Providence for having cast their lot, not in Araby, but Illinois the blest.

Looking toward the north, from my window at the hotel, the great rolling prairie, extending from Ottawa to Chicago, presented itself in a succession of gentle risings and waving lines, all green, yet of such various shades, that there was nothing like sameness or dull insipidity. The Fox River approaches in this direction, and may be seen stealing its way with many windings of coy reluctance, toward that union with the Illinois where it is to lose its name and identity forever. Indeed, in all directions the views are almost unequaled for softness and delicacy, and I hope I may be pardoned for this vain attempt to communicate to my readers a portion of the pleasure I derived from their contemplation. Travelers have a right to such indulgence, since nothing can be more disinterested than for a man to undergo the fatigue of visiting distant places, merely for the gratification of making others as wise as himself.

Ottawa is a fine place for sportsmen, most especially those disciples of Job and St. Anthony who deal with the fishes. The traditionary fishing in the Illinois and Fox Rivers is capital, and there is scarcely a man to be met with, who has not at least once in his life been eminently successful. But it is certainly somewhat peculiar to the gentle science of angling, that the best fishing is always the greatest way off. It is never where you happen to be, but always somewhere else. It is never in the present tense, but always in the past or the future. However excellent it be on the spot, it is always better somewhere else: and the farther you go, the farther off, to the end of the chapter. Then, ten to one, it is too late, or too early; the sun shines too bright; the wind blows too hard, or does not blow at all. In short, there is ever some untoward circumstance in the way of success, and I know no school of patience and philosophy superior to the noble apprenticeship to angling.

The fishing is however good, both in the Fox River and the Illinois. There is a large species called trout, rather from its habits than appearance, which frequents the rapids, and is a noble subject for the angler; while the vulgar fisherman, who affects the still water, may now and then luxuriate in a cat-fish weighing ten or fifteen pounds, and ugly enough to frighten a member of a militia court-martial. There is also the gar-fish, of great size, whose pleasure it is to let you toss him up into the air, without ever catching him, and then see him plump down into the water with the bait, perhaps hook and all, in his jaws. On the whole, however, the sport is extremely agreeable, and the little excursions to the various points renowned for angling, present such a succession of charming scenes, that no one can complain he toiled all day long and caught no fish, who has preserved the happy faculty of enjoying the smiling earth and balmy air.

Add to this, the prairies abound in a species of grouse, affording equal sport to the fowler and the epicure. I am no shot, but my excellent host, who well deserves a passing notice, and who does credit to the Empire state, of which he is a native, was both a capital shot and a first rate angler. Indeed he could do almost any thing, and merited the title of an universal genius as much as any man I have met with. He would every morning rig out his little wagon, drawn by a rough uncivilized Indian pony, which, like old Virginia, “never tires,” and followed by a couple of dogs, sally out on the prairie, whence he never returned without a supply of game. The summer climate is here by no means oppressive; the storms never last a whole day; and, in short, I know few places where a man fond of rural scenes, rural sports, and quiet enjoyments, might spend his time more pleasantly than at the comfortable quarters of mine host at Ottawa, whose name is Delano, and whose house is on the margin of Fox River. “May he live a thousand years, and his shadow never be less.”

Leaving Ottawa, I embarked on the sea of the prairie, and after proceeding a few miles came to a settlement of Norwegians, consisting of a little straggling village, encompassed by luxuriant fields of wheat and corn, showing forth the rich rewards of industry operating in a fertile soil. The buildings and other appendages indicated not only comfort but competency, and I could not avoid being struck with the singularity of a community from the remote regions of Northern Europe planting itself in this secluded spot in the very bosom of the New World. Yet this is by no means a solitary example. Go where we will in the great region of the West, we perceive new evidence of the proud and happy destiny of our country, in being above all others on the face of the earth, the land toward which the eager and longing eye of hope is cast from every corner of Christendom: the land to which poverty turns for relief from its sufferings, and the oppressed for the enjoyment of the rights bestowed by God and filched away by man; the land which alone yields an adequate reward to labor, and gives to honest enterprise its fair field for exertion; the land where pining wretchedness never descends as an heir-loom from generation to generation, and want is not, like wealth, hereditary; the New World, which a gracious Providence seems to have reserved as a refuge and a home to the swarms of industrious bees driven from the parent hive for want of room, want of employment, and want of bread.

This, after all, is the crowning chaplet that adorns the brow of our great republic, and long may it be before it withers. The triumphs of arms, art and literature fade in comparison with those of humanity, and that country which affords the greatest plenty of the necessaries and comforts of life to the greatest proportion of human beings, may justly challenge a pre-eminence over those which place their claims to that distinction merely on the ground of arts and refinements, whose influence is confined to a few, and contributes but little to the happiness, and less to the virtues even of those who make it the sole foundation of their assumptions of superiority. While our country continues to be the refuge of the honest, industrious poor of Europe, who cares for their boasts of those paltry refinements, those exquisite effeminacies, which in all past ages, and in every nation of the world, have been the sure precursors of decay and dissolution. When the descendants of those who were driven to the United States by the privations and discouragements they encountered at home, shall begin to leave the land of their refuge, and return to the bosom of the country of their forefathers in search of bread which they cannot procure here, then, and not till then, may the renovated Old World justly boast of that superiority which is now little more than a dream of long past times.

I have lately seen in some of the English papers exaggerated pictures of the condition of the United States, founded, probably, in the policy of encouraging emigration to her own possessions, or derived from the reports of some few disappointed emigrants who have returned home. It was proclaimed that the country was crushed with debts it never could repay without impoverishing the people by taxation; that labor could neither find employment nor receive adequate reward; that an universal blight had come over the land, and every where withered its prosperity; that the states were bankrupt and the people beggars. All this is sheer declamation. There never has been any thing like widely extended, much less general distress in the United States, arising from a deprivation or curtailment of the necessaries or comforts of life. There never was a time when any class, or any considerable proportion of a class, approached within a thousand degrees, that poverty and destitution which is the common lot of so large a portion of the laboring people of the Old World. The country has at all times been blessed with a plenty, a superfluity, an exuberance of every product essential to human existence, and those who could not obtain them, were either unwilling to make the necessary exertions, or unable to do so by sickness or some other untoward circumstance. The distress complained of is not positive, but comparative. We may be restricted in our luxuries, but the land, from one wide extreme to the other, is absolutely flowing with milk and honey, and it is little less than flying in the face of the bounties of Heaven to complain of hard times, which can only be traced to a superabundance of every thing, and shrink to the earth under the pressure of a debt, the whole of which could be paid is less time than it was contracted, without incurring one-fourth of the burden sustained by the people of England. But we have been spoiled by prosperity Fortuna nisirium quem foret stultum facit. Fifty years of almost uninterrupted prosperity had turned our heads, and it is to be hoped a few years of wholesome reaction will restore us to reason. The sudden cessation of a favorable gale often saves the vessel from running on the rocks and being dashed to pieces.

The prairies have already been described as well perhaps as they ever will be, because they are a sort of lusus naturÆ, and there is nothing with which to compare them. To tell of what ingredients they are composed is easy enough, but to give a just idea of the effects of their combination, requires analogies not to be found in the other productions of nature, nor in the imagery of the mind. Although substantial realities, they present nothing but deceptions, and I believe it is beyond the power of language, almost imagination, to exaggerate the strange and beautiful combination of what is, and what is not, sporting together in perfect harmony on these boundless plains. The eye becomes at length wearied with being thus perpetually the dupe of imaginary forms, and imaginary distances, while the mind involuntary revolts at the deceptions practiced on the senses. Mr. Bryant in poetry, and Mr. Hoffman and Mr. Catlin in prose, have done all that can be done to convey to those who have never seen them an impression of the effect of these happy eccentricities of nature, and the beautiful phantasmagoria they exhibit forth to the senses and the imagination.

If ever miser were pardoned for coveting his neighbors land, it might be such land as the prairies of Illinois, where man labors almost without the sweat of his brow, and the crops are so abundant that all I heard the good people complain of was having more than they knew what to do with. This is indeed a lamentable state of things, and it were I think much to be wished that some of our philosophical lecturers would discuss the relative advantages of having too much and too little of a good thing. The case of an individual being overburthened with superfluity, is easily disposed of, as he has only to turn it over to his neighbors who may be in want; but when entire communities, states and confederations of states, labor under this inconvenience, where nobody wants, and all have plenty to bestow; in other words, where all wish to sell and nobody cares to buy, it must be confessed there occurs a crisis of such deplorable difficulty, that I can conceive no effectual remedy except two or three years of famine like those which succeeded the seven years of plenty in Egypt. This would consume the mischievous surplus, and rid them of an evil which as it never before occurred, has never been provided against by the wisdom of legislation, which most people believe can perform impossibilities. But be this as it may, I passed over a vast region where the table of every man groaned under superfluities, and every brood of swine wasted more corn than would supply bread to a family of English manufacturers. Yet I found all, without exception, in the last stage of hopeless despondency, until one day I entered the log-cabin of an old negro woman, a slave, who was enjoying her pipe at ease, and upon asking the usual commonplace question of “how times went with her,” was answered with the most cheerful alacrity—“O bravely, massa. Hens ’gin to lay finely.” We hear of nations suffering from famine, but my unfortunate countrymen complain of nothing but plenty. Whence comes this strange paradox? Is it because men have sought to invent artificial means of prosperity which act in direct opposition to the great general laws of Providence, and are thus punished for their presumptuous folly by a new, unheard of infliction?

After riding a distance of some seventy or eighty miles on the prairie, over the best natural roads in the world, I halted at the house of a Dutch farmer from the banks of the Hudson, where I heard that old patriarchal language spoken for the first time in many years. There are several descendants of the ancient Hollanders settled in this quarter, to which they are tempted by the broad rich flats, and the easiness of their cultivation. I have observed that those who partake largely in this blood, though almost uniformly steady and industrious in their habits, don’t much like hard, fatiguing work. They prefer labor where there is no violent exertion or straining, no heavy burthens to lift or carry, and no call for extraordinary efforts to achieve what may be accomplished in the ordinary way without them. Hence they are great amateurs in good land, easy to cultivate and yielding liberal returns. In this I think they are perfectly right. Without doubt, it is the destiny of civilized man to labor, that is in moderation. But to labor without the rewards of labor; to be for ever toiling, and panting, and sweating over a piece of rough, stony land, on which the malediction of eternal barrenness has been denounced ever since the creation of the world; to be ever sowing wheat and reaping nothing but tares, is in my opinion, utterly unphilosophical, and unworthy of all men who can go farther and fare better.

A particular occasion had drawn together at this spot a large cavalcade of both sexes, gayly caparisoned and well-mounted, many of the females being equipped in riding-habits, hats with feathers, and all more or less picturesque in their appearance. They chose to accompany the carriage to a little town about six or seven miles distant, over a beautiful expanse of prairie, or as it might be aptly termed, “faerie land,” exhibiting a succession of grassy lawns and beds of flowers of hundreds of acres, marshaled under different colors, some were red, some blue, and others entirely yellow. It is difficult to imagine a more gay and beautiful spectacle than that presented on this occasion. The sky was sufficiently obscured to temper the glare of sunshine, which is sometimes here painful to the eye, and the playful cavalcade, consisting of perhaps an hundred, indulged in a thousand careless, graceful evolutions on the level greensward, that seemed without beginning or end, and offered no obstruction in any direction. Sometimes a pair of riders of both sexes would dash out from the throng, and scamper away until they appeared like shadows against the distant horizon; and at others, the whole mass would separate in different directions, skimming over the plain like Arabs on their winged steeds, their different colored dresses and picturesque costumes rendering the scene indescribably gay and animating. The females all without exception sat and managed their horses with that perfect skill and grace arising from constant habit, and upon the whole, I never witnessed any exhibition that could compare with this ride on the prairie of Illinois in romantic interest and novelty.

Thus, toward evening, I reached the pleasant town which was to be my resting-place for the night. By some strange perversion of ignorance, or freak of vanity, it is nicknamed Juliet, instead of Joliet, from the old pioneer of that name, who established his quarters here in olden time on a mount, which, fortunately, has escaped being travestied into Juliet, and still preserves his name. This mount is one of the most remarkable, as well as beautiful objects in nature. It rises directly from the prairie to the height, I should judge, of more than an hundred feet; is clothed with a rich velvet coat of grass on all sides, as well as at the summit; is entirely distinct from any other eminence; comprises an area of six or eight acres, and is as regular and perfect in construction, form, and outline, as any work of art I ever saw. It has been generally taken by travelers for a creation of those mysterious mound-builders, whose name and history have passed into oblivion, and who have left no memorials of their existence but such as render it only more inexplicable. It is, however, as I ascertained, a production of the cunning hand of Nature, who sometimes, it would seem, amuses herself by showing how much she can excel her illegitimate sister, Art, even in her most successful attempts at imitation. The canal connecting the Illinois with the lakes, runs directly at the foot of this mount, which with something like Gothic barbarity has been deeply excavated on one side, in order to form the outward bank. This process has disclosed a succession of different strata of earth, clay, and gravel, all regularly defined, and evidently not the work of man, but of the world of craters, which beyond doubt covered all the surrounding country, long posterior to the subsiding of the great deluge.

The Sieur Joliet, who tradition says, once resided on the top of this mount, which is flat and comprises several acres of rich meadow, was one of the adventurous heroes who first found their way from Canada to the Valley of the West. Little is known of him, except that he preceded or accompanied La Salle in some of his discoveries on the Mississippi, for which, says Charleroix, “he received a grant of the island of Anticosti, which extends about forty degrees north-west and south-east, and lies at the mouth of the River St. Lawrence. But they made him no great present; it is absolutely good for nothing. It is poorly wooded, its soil is barren, and it has not a single harbor where a ship can lie in safety.” I regret to differ with the good father, whose description shows it to be eminently calculated for the site of a great emporium, and am surprised that it has hitherto escaped the notice of our illustrious founders of cities in places where it is all rocks and no water. But be this as it may, the Sieur Joliet is particularly unfortunate in having been rewarded for his services by an island worth nothing, and defrauded by ignorance or vanity of the honor of giving his name to a beautiful and thriving town.

Some fifteen years ago the place occupied by the town of Joliet was the seat of Black Hawk’s power. It now contains twelve or fifteen hundred white people, and is a busy, growing place, with reasonable anticipations of becoming considerably larger in good time. The frank, hospitable, spirited, and intelligent people of this noble region of the West, must not, however, calculate too confidently on all their towns becoming great cities because they grow with astonishing rapidity at the first starting. Great cities, like great men, do not spring up in all places and every where. A large portion of these towns, like children, will probably increase in size the first few years, more than in all their lives afterward. Many will stop short in their growth, and many will gradually be swallowed up by some neighboring rival, whose natural advantages, or some fortunate concurrence of circumstances, will enable it to secure the ascendancy, and render all the others tributary to its prosperity. When this ascendency is permanently acquired, nothing but inferior towns can flourish in its immediate vicinity, and like all great bodies, they will become the centre of attraction.

The canal connecting the Mississippi with the Lakes runs through the town, and is here finished in a most admirable and substantial manner. It is identified with the River Des Planes, which has been circumscribed by a wall to prevent its overflowing. There are here two locks, and a basin, equal to any I have ever seen, and indeed, all the permanent stonework of this canal appears to have been done in the most substantial and perfect style. A canal completing a line of inland water communication to the extent of from three to four thousand miles, by a cut of scarcely more than a hundred, through a region which is almost an apparent level, and presents perhaps fewer natural obstructions than any other of the same extent to be found elsewhere, is not only a noble, but a feasible undertaking. Its advantages are too obvious to require enumeration; it is in fact, essentially a national work, and stands a monument of rational foresight, among a thousand visionary schemes of sanguine folly, or selfish fraud. It is already more than two-thirds completed, and I conceive that New York is almost as deeply interested in the final issue as Illinois.

Leaving this fair and flourishing town, which still affords me many agreeable recollections of natural beauty and kind hospitality, I visited in my way to Chicago, the village of Lockport, which has grown up in anticipation of the completion of the canal. The descent of the River Des Planes is here sufficient to afford ample water-power for mills and manufactories, and this, in a country so level that the water half the time does not know which way to run, is quite enough to excite the sanguine adventurers to this promised land to a degree of delirium, and set them “kalkilating,” as Sam Slick has it, a hundred degrees beyond the ratio of geometrical progression. There is little reason to doubt that Lockport will become a considerable manufacturing town in process of time, after the canal is finished; but the far-sighted seekers into futurity would perhaps do well to bear in mind, that there must be people before there are cities; that these latter are the children, not the parents of the country, and that it is not good policy to wait so long for the grass to grow that two or three generations of steeds starve in the meantime. It is well to look a little to the present as well as the future, and not be for ever gazing at the shadowy mountain in the distance, least we fall into the ditch directly under our noses.

A few hours ride in a delightful morning, partly over rich cultivated prairie lands, brought me to Chicago, at the southern extremity of Lake Michigan. It is a fine town, and notwithstanding the blight of speculation which has swept the land from Dan to Beersheba, continues steadily on the increase. This is the best possible proof of innate constitutional vigor, and affords sufficient augury of its future growth and prosperity. To all these sanguine young cities and citizens, might I assume the universal privilege of giving advice, I would recommend the maxim of the wise Emperor Augustus, though I confess it is somewhat anti-republican to cite such an authority—festina lente—hasten slowly—be not in too great a hurry to grow big and to get rich, and do not crow before daylight, like ambitious young roosters, who aspire to be beforehand with the sun.

After remaining three or four days at Chicago, and making several agreeable acquaintances, among which was an enterprising old gentleman of four score, who had come there, as he said, “to seek his fortune,” I bade farewell to the State of Illinois, bearing on my mind the impression that there was not in any country of the known world, a region of the same extent combining within itself a greater portion of the elements of substantial and enduring prosperity. At the same time, I could not help lamenting that blessed as it is in its soil, its climate, its geographical position, and its industrious population, it had been precipitated from the summit of hope to the lowest abyss of debt and depression, by turning its back on the advantages which nature had gratuitously bestowed, to snatch at others that Providence had withheld. Though the immediate source of these pressing difficulties of the state, is without doubt improvident legislation, yet let not the good people of Illinois lay all the blame on their law-makers and rulers. They were chosen by their own free voices, and in many cases, for the express purpose of carrying out those very projects which in their vast accumulation have created these embarrassments. It was the feverish anxiety, the headlong haste, the insatiable passion for growing rich in a hurry, independently of the exertions of labor and the savings of economy, that brought them and other states where they are now standing shivering on the verge of bankruptcy.

In the United States the people are the sovereign, and all power either for good or evil emanates from them. If they allow their own passions, or the seductions of others, to lead them astray, it is but a weak evasion to cast the blame on those who were only enabled to perpetrate the offence by the power which they themselves delegated. Let them then set about retrieving the consequences of their adherence to mischievous maxims and habits, by returning to those which if firmly adopted and steadily pursued, will be speedily followed by returning prosperity. Let the contest be, not who is to blame for the evil, but who shall be foremost in proposing an effectual remedy and contributing all in his power to bring it about. In short, let them only save as much in the next, as they wasted in the last twenty years, instead of resorting for relief to the very measure which produced the disease, and place their affairs in the hands of clear-sighted honest men, instead of great financiers, whose only expedient for paying one debt is contracting another, and my life on it, they will redeem themselves in less time than it took to enthral them. But we who live in glass houses should never throw stones. Illinois has enough of the sisterhood to keep her in countenance.

Charleroix, vol. ii. p. 102, 103.