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c 9^ >.3 . A* 82 And treachery poured its tide upon our head. Our little store for mammon’s filthy gold Was by the hand of t craving avarice sold, Which doomed our race o’er all the earth to roam, And, worst of all, Oh ! God, we lost our home! Soon death relieved^my kinsmen of their wo, And laid my father and my mother low, And brothers bore to meet the silent tomb, And sisters, where yon nodding violets bloom, While I alone, sad relic of my race, Review the memories of this sacred place, Houseless and homeless, all a wanderer here, W ith neither friend, nor even acquaintance near. Oh! ye who, blessed with fortune's, sell your homes, To go where lucre’s fitful phantom roams, Who catch at nothings which your gods propose, Who, to caress the thorn, desert the rose. Toll me can nauarht but worthless gold inspire, Or kindle in your stolid hearts desire? Where sleep your fathers, that ye sell their graves, To bow at mammon’s filthy alter—slaves? Where do.your aged mothers find repose, That to their memories you yoUr bosoms close'? Where sleep your wives, where do ) our chil dren sleep ? Oh! go and how your shameless heads and weep! Weep for your homes andbrokeu aharsspoiled ! Weep for your hearts by filthy lucre soiled! TV eep tor your degradation, afid your shame! To being men ye forfeit every claim ! No wonder that yotfr country barren grows, No wonder that the thoru expe’s the rose, When ye have robbed the laud of all its fruit, To give penurious avarice high repute; Since ye despoil the homesteads of the land, And prowling priests round mammon’s altar stand; Since ye bear off ithe fatness of the soil, And fertile valleys of their fruit despoil. No wonder Heaven upon you seems to frown, Since ye have broken all its altars down, And .on their ruins rear your altars high, Whose smoke ascends to greet a golden sky. Enjoyment of Life. “ How small a portion of our life it is that we .enjoy ! In youth \v^ are looking forward to things that are to come; in old age we are looking backward to things that are past; in manhood, altho’ we appear to he move occupied in things that are present, yet even that is too often absorbed in vague determination to be vastly happy on some future day, when we have time. When young, we trust ourselves too much, and we trust ourselves too little when old. Hashness is the error of youth, timid caution of age. Manhood istheisthmus between the two ex tremes ; the ripe, the fertile season of action when alone we caD hope to find the head to contrive, united with the hand to exe cute.” e. w. R. “ Men sometimes think they hate flat tery, but they hate only the manner of it.” THE COUNTRYMAN. Funny and Not Funny. On the 28th uit., brother Clisby, under the title of “ A Crash into the Extortion ers,” got very nearly on his head, at the idea of the fan which he was to see when the seizing agents got among the manufac turers, tanners, and owners of army sup plies. His bull was then goring some one else’s ox, and the unjust lawyer (so to speak) of the Telegraph, was in ecstacies over the piteous moans of the poor ox. But 3 days afterwards, on the' 1st inst., somebody’s bull got to goring brother Clis- by’s ox—(or at least somebody's dog got to tearing his sheep)—and the lawyer straight way took to “ laughing on the other side of his month.” It was very funny to brother Clisby to see manufacturers and tanners suffer, be cause he said he was a ‘ buyer’ and not a ‘ seller.’ But no doubt my friend lias had to pay a high price for jeans, this winter, to make his ‘unmentionables',* and lie no doubt hoped that if the dog law passed, the in creased supply of lambs whose lives would be saved thereby, would make wool more plentiful next season, arid he would be able to get another pair of pants at diminished rates. But the dog law failed, and some of the legislators ‘ made fun of it.’ At. this, brother Clisby waxes exceeding ly lacrymose, and-on the 1st, day of tins month, in an article under the caption of “ Dog Law Lost,” sends up a most lugubri ous wail over his liSud fate (so I suppose) in seeing his prospect for cheap pantaloons blasted. He castigates most unmercifully the House of Representatives for their “deal of jest and mirth” over the corpse of the d-»g law. He says, “ It does appear to us that the House made a bad selection of a mirthful subject” For Ids part, be “ don’t see where the mirth comes in properly.” Very good, brother Clisby. And do you suppose that those who are to be robbed by government officials, under the name of seizure, can see that you made a good se lection of a mirthful subject j when you laughed so immoderately over their misfor tune ? Do you suppose they can see where the “ mirth comes in properly ?” Do you not suppose they feel just as badly ovei; the logs of their goods and chattels as you do over the prospective high price of your pantaloons, next winter, because the dogs spared by the failure of Mr. Schley’s bill, will kill so many sheep between now and then ? * But seriously : Though a great friend to dogs, and very fond of field sports, if broth er Clisby will help put down this unlawful j seizure which is fast destroying all industrial suits, as well as liberty, and government itself, I shall be tempted to help him out with the dog law. An Error. The Southern Presbyterian, in commen ting upon Dr. Talmage’s letter in favor of teaching negroes to read the bible, says “If our legislators have put the Christian Scriptures against our institutions, by put ting our institutions against that Divine Book, the sooner and more completely we get them to repeal their laws, the better.” It is evident that the Presbyterian has fallen into the error of supposing that there is a statute in, our code whose specific word ing and purpose are to prevent negroes from reading the bible. How often will this er ror have to be corrected ? There is no law on our statute book pre venting the /fading of thehihle by negroes. There is simply a statute against teaching negroes to read, and the object was not to “put our institutions against the Divine Book,” but to prevent the evil influences of abolition documents which the yankees once proposed to circulate ameng our ne groes, through the U. 8. mails. Do those who talk about there being a law in our code against negroes’ reading the bible, reflect what they are saying and doing ? Is it ignorance, or a loose way of talking, that induces them thus to misrep resent and virtually slander (without in tending it) our laws? lfow to Ask for a Penny. “ It has often been said that the mem bers of the society of Friends are possessed, from their youth, of more than an ordinary share of acuteness. The following fact may serve as a proof of this assertion : Some time ago, Mr , a most respecta ble iron-founder, of Birmingham, discover ed that his son, a hoy of 5 years of age, was accustomed to ask those gentlemen who came to his house to give him money, and immediately extorted a promise from him, under a threat of correction, that he would not do so anv more. The next day Mr , his father’s partner, called, and the boy evaded a breach of his promise by saying, ‘ Friend, dost thou know auyone who would loan me a penny, and not re quire it of me again V ” Miss V. Pai.mer, M'lledgeville.— You now have credit for The Countryman up to the 29th Nov., 1863. “ We confess small faults in order to in** | sinuate that we have no great one.”