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UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA LIBRARY £p\
HPje 4beur]i a fiupmuicc
JOAN H. SEALS, Editor and Proprietor.
Safe’ J epdnteni
Mrs. Mary E. Bryan, Editress.
A happy New Year to our dear six thousand
readers! Verily, so genially disposed are we
thW 5 morning, th&t we should drink their healths
•fi sf > bowl of foaming eggnog, did not our temper
ance principles forbid it.
As it is, we can only reiterate our good* wishes
over a cup of Dr. Johnson’s favorite Hyson, which
that ,;t< in old epicure entreats his “ Rennie dear”
give to him, “ with cream and sugar softened
well.” ( Par parenthesis; there are many bever
ages less innocent than the drink of the Celes
tials, that have not half its heart-cheering effects.)
We have to-day measured another milestone in
the journey of life, and the track, marked by our
footprints, lies behind us, with its light and sha
dow, while the future, bright with the eoleur de
rose of hope, awaits our coming tread.
It is the day for forming new and better reso
lutions, for indulging kindly feelings, for turning
anew leaf in the book of life, and dedicating the
unwritten page to a nobler purpose. It is the
day for gratitude and love and forgiveness ; for
erjfcsfc. aj|d hope and steadfast resolves ; but it
may Be that there are sad hearts looking back
mournfully into the Past, and shrinking from the
haiifi of Time that urges them forward. Let such
fainting ones look abroad and learn a lesson from
brave old Nature, who is at her winter task of
invigorating mother Earth with frosty tonics,
that she may be ready for the work of spring;
and let the free, strong winds that come down
from the North, tossing the plumes of the pines
and scattering the obstructing foliage, stir their
flagging energies like the blast of a clarion, and
bid them
11 Be up and doing,
With a hoart for any fate.”
It is just a twelvemonth, dear patrons of the
Crusader , since we took you by the hand in a
friendly greeting, and since that time, wo have
been a frequent visitant to your homes.
pleasant to fancy that we havo been
welcr.jtfed; that even a few have learned to love
us, or that a single gentle heart has warmed with
woman's ready sympathy towards one whose eye
might.never meet her kindly glance.
The hallucination is a sweet one, and we would
not have it rudely dispelled.
But we must bo still better friends for the fu
ture, gentle readers ; for we have left, for your
sakes, our pleasant home and the dear ones
whose presence makes it the sweetest place op
earth to us. That we may be better enabled to in
terest you, we exchange the jasmines and roses ;
the singing birds and pleasant sounds of our
country home for less congenial scenes, and fore
go, for a long year, the happiness of sweet do
mestic intercourse. We shall sadly miss all the
simple home pleasures—the father’s loving coun
sel, the mother’s goodnight kiss upon our brow,
the twining arms and lisping tones of the little
who calls us by the holy name of
and sadly shall we miss the quiet old
. with the breath of acacias, tho
JfaSTrvwhose feathery boughs trembled over
our page as w® wrote ; but your smiles of en
couragement shall compensate for these, and we
will all do our utmost to merit them, and to ren
der tho Crusader deserving of your patronag. To
our Korthy principal is allotted the task of wag
ing -war against Bacchante and her votaries, the
author of “ Ink-drops” shall instruct you with
his able pen, and, for ourselves, we shall be well
content if our humble efforts beguile the tedium
of a passing hour, or furnish a brief entertain
ment for the fireside group.
But quantum sufficit l Wo had no intention of
taking you by the button hole for a long winded
conference, and so once more wo wish you tho
happiest of New Years, generous friends. May
the fates be propitious during the cycle which
Aries has bo auspiciously ushered in; may every
good fortune befall you; may your spring bon
nets be “perfect loves,” your coats fit without a
wrinkle, your babies be models of good beha-
wives counterparts of Patience Griz
zle, ytur landladies patterns of amiability, and
when, at the close of ’59, your coffers overflow
with the yield of harvest and the profits of mer
chandise, may you set aside, first of all, the trifle
that %so justly due the Printer. • M. B. B.
A WEALTHY EDITOR!
A new addition of Fortunatus is Robert Bon
ner of the New York Ledger; a Machiavelli in
policy ; a Louis Napoleon (on a small scale) in
diplomacy; a Barnum in humbuggery. He is
that hitherto mythical being—a wealthy Editor—
and he has attained his present notoriety and
popularity partly by his cool assurance, partly by
his adroit management and partly by being born
to good luck ; for, let philosophers say what they
please, there is a great deal in “ luck,” in this un
accountable world of ours.. And there is much,
too, in Impudence. Brass is almost as good a
pavement to the path of success as gold itself,
and Esop barbed his satire with truth when he
the beasts, choosing the monkey for
their king on account of his knowing looks and
pretended contempt for the crown. Bonner’s as
surance helped him greatly. From the first, he
tone of unqestioned superiority, well
aware that the way to command the respect of
the mass, is to show that you have a contempt
for it. He withered, with his cutting sarcasms
and curt refusals, any number of pretended ap
plicants for admission to his charmed columns.
Ho replied with oracular wisdom to the queries
of a score or two of imaginary correspondents, all
humbly asking information of this human Ency
clopedia of knowledge. His epigramatic replies
to the assaults of his “envious” enimies, his con
temptuous judgment on all “ voluntary contribu
tions” were delivered as from the throne of the
Caesars, and every arrogant period said, plainly
as words could do, *
_“J am Sir Oracle, and when I ope
* ’ J- i(y mouth, let no dog bark.”
Then, he understands thoroughly the delicate
art of humbugging, and his plan of advertising
and puffing- was admirable from its ingenuity.
Every variety of puff was exhausted upon his
excelsior sheet—the puff direct, collateral, sug
gestive, ambiguous, and every enticing bait that
could be used to deceive that often deluded, but
ever gullibtif victim—the Public. Fragments of
novellettes of the high pressure order calculated
to excite th? romance loving appetites of the peo
| pie, were throughout the country,
breaking when the hero or heroine
was chin deep in distress, and referring to the
New York Ledger for their continuation.
Hints were thrown out concerning the extrava
gant prices paid for contributions. Ingeniously
worded “wonders” a3 to what this Editorial
intended doing next, together with ad
miring allusions to his fast horses, splendid
equipage and all eclipsing journal, found their
way into city anttyountry papers in some myste
rious manner, probably Mr. Bonner could
explain, if he would.
The famous hundred-dollar-a-column story of
Fanny Fern was a.capital investment, for it af
forded an “ item” for gossip-loving editors, and
served to extend .the reputation of the Ledger.
Indeed, Mr. Bonner declared, that he would will
ingly have paid double the sum for the story had
he known the profit that would accrue from its
publication, and the notoriety attending tho bar
gain. Quite recently he. has achieved another
admirable coup d’etat, by offering the enormous
sum of ten thousand dollars per annum to Ed
ward Everett for a series of short articles, to be
called the “Mount Vernon Papers.”
The uninitiated might fancy this a rather pro
fitless compact to the employer, but the wily ed
itor was far-seeing in his calculations. He knew
that the circumstance would be blazoned fo/th
with a grand flourish of trumpets in every maga
zine, paper and thumb-paper in the land, and
would prove the most attractive advertisement of
his journal that could possibly be contrived.
Moieover, the condition —which he was shrewd
enough to apprehend—that the money should be
donated to the “ Mount Vernon Association”—
would, of itself) have secured celebrity to the act,
even if Everett’s popularity was not such as to
warrant the pun of the witty Prentice, that “ fame
■ follows applause where Ever-ett goes.”
By such strokes of policy as these, has Mr.
Bonner become a Prince among editors; but his
vory prosperity puts him beyond the pale of that
sympathy and interest which the kind-hearted
public generally award to the fraternity of “ poor
printers.” What does he know of the trials and
privations that belong proverbially to the man
of quill and scissors ? Has he ever been dis
turbed in the concoction of a frantic editorial, b 7
the discordant scrape, scrape of his wife’s ladle
against the bottom of the empty flour barrel ?
Has he ever looked sheepish in endeavoring to
seem unconcerned when his cara sposa opened
her matrimonial lecture with tho momentous
question, “What is bacon worth now ?”
Has he ever felt his heart sink like a frightened
tadpole when, after succeeding in pouncing upon
a delinquent subscriber, he is coolly informed by
that amiable gentleman that ho “sha’ntpay him
nary cent, for he did’nt want his no ’count paper
no how, and aint took it out of the office for a
year ?” Has ho ever had to drive the quill for
dear life all day, with disturbing visions of the
grocer’s bill, and then, as a pleasant recreation,
been permitted to walk the baby half the night,
his brief naps being haunted by any number of
nocate’s shrieking, “Stop my paper,” in his
dreaming ear ?
Fortunate Robert Bonner ! Nothing to do but
read complimentary notices of himself and his
paper, write sage replies to imaginary correspon
dents and drive that very fast and famous lady,
Fanny Fern, down Broadway, behind his no less
fast and famous span of Black horses.
LOVE.
“ He prayeth best who loveth best
All things, both great and small.”
No intellect, however subtle, can epitomise,
erystalise, as it were, all the attributes of love in
a single sentence, mysterious as life, boundless
and all-pervading as light, strong as death, and
deathless as the soul, love fills the universe with
its silent glory, and rests, a radiant halo, on the
far shores of eternity. ,It is the arch that up
holds society; it is tho bow of promise that spans
the gulf of death ; it is the heartsease that blos
soms by life’s pathway ; it is the golden gate of
Paradise; it is the language of untaught lips ; it
is the theme of seraphs ; it is felt by lisping child
hood ; its mysteries fill the book of angels, and
ages of eternity shall be spent in unfolding them
to the beatified souls of men.
Love is the twin sister of Life. It is first at
the cradle, last at the bed of death. It is the first
to dawn in the blue eyes of the babe, last to fade
from the dimmed orbs of age. It parts in smiles
the red lips of milk-fed infancy, when the tiny
hands first flutter with faint consciousness about
the mother’s neck ; and when its white wings are
once folded on the young heart, it will leave it
never more, though grief and time may stain the
purity of its plumage and mar the sweetness of
its song.
Earth-stained though it be, drooping with
trailing wing and not daring to lift its eyes above,
it is still love —beautiful, blessed love—the holiest
gift of Heaven to man. He leans upon the arm
of love in all life’s weary wanderings, and when
Death’s strong grasp is upon him, he looses the
dear hand lingeringly and with the blessed as
surance of clasping it again on the “thither
shore.” Love can steal its silent way into hearts
barred to all other virtues, and given up to the
dominion of fiends. No human soul, though en
cased in the iron of despair and distrust, can re
sist the sweet influence of love; for love is the
law of nature and nature’s God. Cynics have
effected to sneer at its gentle ministrations, mis
anthropes have laughed it to scorn, but nature
would assert her right, and if deprived of natural
outlets, love would turn and cling with yearning
tenderness around inferior animals and even in
animate objects. Defoe understood this principle
of human nature, when he portrayed his Crusoe,
unhappy in his beautiful solitude, because de
barred from social love and companionship, and
lavishing passionate fondness on the dumb in
mates of his island home. Matthews, the aide
camp of the ill-fated Riego, during the many
years he languished in prison, had what he
termed “ his angel” sent to him in the guise of a
white dove, that beat against the grated window
of his cell until his hand drew the sweet stran
ger in ; and ever after, it shared his lot of im
prisonment and loneliness,partaking of his scanty
meals and sleeping at night in the shelter of his
bosom. Thus, the human heart proves that it
will not be defrauded of its natural right.
Love is the Alchemist that transforms life’s
meanest things to gold, making poverty sweet,
self-sacrifice pleasant, and imparting a delicate
oharm to ignorance and rusticity. To love be
long the purest eloquence, the most exquisite im
agery, the subtlest reasoning and the most ten
der and touching poetry. Love sets the psalm •
of life to sweetest melody, and throws a halo-like
moonlight over the world’s harshest realities.
Woman’s nature has been made, by Provi
dence, peculiarly rich in the treasures of affec
tion, that she may pour them, like incense, pon
the shrine of homo ; that she may be enabled to
fulfill her high mission through the long suffer
ing and patient gentleness of love, and that she
may veil with its divine charity the faults of the
unworthy ones whom she seeks to save by her
devotion. Love has made timid woman heroines.
It has nerved them to face poverty, to endure
contempt and neglect, to bear up bravely against
a breaking heart, and to dety danger and death.
Wherever there are sin and blight, disease and
want, despair and squalid poverty, th<9?3, too,
you may find love the angel and woman the com
forter, and, God be thanked, the “ weaker vessel”
is the stronger in her patient, long-enduring
conquering love. Waken once the mother’s ten
derness, the wife’s devotion, and there is pot a
hand under Heaven that can placo the seal upon
the overflowing fountain.
FOR THE CULTURE OF TRUTH, MORALITY AND LITERARY EXCELLENCE.
Like the “ Gertrude” of history, she would
stand by the wheel of torture amid the jeering
crowd, forgetful of self, in her efforts to soothe
and strengthen the last hours of the beloved one.
For, as the wave gives forth its phosphorescent
light only when its waters are troubled, so wo
man knows not the rich depths of her own affec
tion till they are stirred by misfortune and sor
row. Then, her every action breathes the lan
guage of love’s deep devotedness.
“ I have stood by thee in thine hour
Os glory and of bliss:
Doubt not its memory’s living power
To strengthen me through this.”
But there may be souls whom tho Simoom of
passion and despair have left a barren waste, and
whose fountains of kindly feeling have been
changed by injustice and wrong into marahs of
bitterness. But even in such deserts, there is
dew enough to nourish the heartsease of human
love, though not its passion-flower.
There are Hagars, driven out into the world’s
wilderness, ehafing like the wounded lioness be
neath the sense of wrong, and with unuttered
curses in their hearts and despair upon their
brows; but, like their Egyptian prototype, there
is still a human feeling softening the fierceness
of their eyes, though none but the mother love—
stronger than death—could throne itself on the
ashes of such a desolation.
Love is the crown of Deity. Omniscience,
power, glory, grandeur—all the prerogatives of
Divinity yield to the crowing attribute of Love.
Not in the rush of the tempest nor the reel of
the earthquake, did God unveil himself to” his
prophet of old, but in the “still, small voice”
that thrilled his soul like the peal of a thousand
trumpets. “ God is love,” is the basis on which
rests all hope for the future, all happiness for the
present. It is the arch that supports the pave
ment of Heaven, the pillar that upholds the tem
ple of immortality itself.
We have faith in the ultimate perfectibility of
the human race, in the eoming of that millenium
which heathen and Christian seers have foretold.
Already the watchmen on the holy hills of prayer
proclaim that the night is faßt waning, and the
harbingers of a glorious morning are visible in
their unclouded eyes. And love shall be the
morning star of that radiant dawning.
Love shall be man’s redemption : not power,
nor intellect, wealth nor genius shall be chosen
as the instrument of salvation, but all shall yield
to the sweet, strong influence of the victor—Love.
L shall lay its hand upon the hoary head
of Earth and restore it to its pristine bloom and
beauty. It shall garland the globe with the roses
of an eternal spring, and make of every home a
sanctuary, upon whose walls shall be written the
one golden law of the age—“ Love the Lord thy
God with all the strength of thy soul, and thy
neighbor as thy self.” M. E. B.
GROWING OLD GRACEFULLY.
Old age, in itself, is far from being unlovely.
Nature, who is an impartial mother, compensates
for the loss of- youth's bloom and vivacity, by the
more enduring charms of gentleness, wisdom and
chastened dignity. The silvered locks and fur
rowed brow excite tenderness and veneration,
and speak of treasures of experience gleaned in
the long pilgrimage of life. The green fields of
young grain are beautiful, with the April sun
shine upon them, but not less attractive when,
ripe and golden, they hang, ready for tho scythe
of the harvester; nor is a wise and serene ma
turity less interesting than the freshness and ef
fervescent buoyancy of youth. Jean Paul thus
beautifully illustrates one privilege of old age:
As in winter, the stripping away of the foliage
from the forest extends the view to prospects un
seen before, so in the autumn of life the exuber
ant hopes, joys and fancies of youth are borne
away by Time, that the soul may obtain an un
obstructed view of eternity.
But* as the wise Rochefoucault pertinently re
marks, there are “ few who understand the art
of growing old gracefully.” Some receive every
fresh advance of time with additional petulance
and fretful repining, while others, reluctant to
lose the fascinations of youth, call Art in requi
sition to repair the ravages of unflattering Na
ture. Instead of yielding gracefully to the mel
lowing hand of Time, they regard wrinkles and
gray hairs as disagreeable traitors, and wage war
against them with all the artillery drawn from
the well supplied armory of fashion, as hair-dyes
and restoratives, porcelain teeth, periwigs, false
fronts, cosmetics and lotions, ad infinitum.
There is no sight upon earth more disgusting
than that of a faded belle, clinging with desper
ate tenacity to the fast vanishing charms of her
youth, with artificial bloom dropped into her
sunken cheeks, and a girlish dress and carriage,
affected to hide infirmities, which would else call
forth the respectful sympathy of beholders.
Thanks to our healthy national principles, this
affectation . jenality is not universal this side
the Atlantic; but among French fashionables,
whore tho subject of age is interdicted after
thirty, even in the closest family intercourse, there
is no such thing as beautiful and natural old age;
but men and women pursue the butterflies of
pleasure on the tottering limbs of age, coquetting
and masquerading, as it were, with death, and
pertinaciously “ frisking beneath the burden of
three-score.” There, the female who has been
kept in the nursery by her selfish mama, only
emerges from white muslins and corals at an age
when our American women are wives and moth
ers, and then at forty, blossoms, aloe like, into a
full blown belle. Compare our mothers and
grandmothers, in their time-honored arm
chairs by the winter fireside, with their worsted
knitting; their smoothly-parted, silver-threaded
hair and snowy caps ; their broad-rimmed spec
tacles, neat checked aprons, inseparable bunch of
keys, and kind, motherly faces : compare these
dear guardians of our domestic interests with
those dashing dowagers of the same age, who, in
exceedingly low corsages, bare arms, rouged
cheeks and stiff curls, gallop through
the ball-room figures, with young men in their
arms and a disgusting leer on their features,
which, however, cannot conceal the involuntary
grimace excited by admonitory twinges of rheu
matism. And compare our revered and reverend
grandfathers with the bewigged old beaux of
French society, who, in flashy vests and dyed
moustaches, bid defiance to the gout and smile
excruciatingly at young damsels thirty years
their junior. “ Horses ofthe Apocalypse in fan
tastical harness,” a piquant French writer styles
these rejuvenated antiquarians ; and truly it is
enough to provoke satire, to see men and women,
whose age might warrant their being sage coun
sellors of youth, “play such fantastic tricks before
high Heaven.”
No marvel that frivolity and want of reverence
aro national characteristics of the French.
To grow old gracefully—to relinquish with
serene composure the charms of youth for the
less brilliant graces of maturity, only requires
that we should be true to nature. Plain and
simple attire and a subdued and quiet manner—
the result of chastening experience—are as nat
ural to the winter of life as are stillness and a
Atlanta, Georgia, January 1, 1859.
sober livery to the corresponding season of the
year; and if, to the innate sense of propriety is
added the softening influence of Christian phil
osophy, then may not old age, in its peaceful
serenity, ite quiet cheerfulness and resignation,
be lovelier.than youth in the zenith of its bloom
and beauty? M. E. B.
OUR “RESTRICTED PRESS.”
Ignoranch of the United States of her policy
and her progress, is not confined to the unlettered
portion of England.
The “ big wigs” who preside over that Del
phian Oracle —the Edinburgh Review —occasion-
ally make very singular mistakes. The last num
ber of that well known quarterly contains a re
view of the London Cotton Plant, where, af
ter denouncing, in most virulent language, the
South and her peculiar institution, tho writer
proceeds to make the most absurd and unfoun
ded assertions, representing the South as a coun
try of “ exhausted estates, hopeless mortgages
and crumbling mansions,” inhabited by “ a race
of bullies, ” in a state of “ intellectual barbarism,
ignorant of books and of life, and unskilled in all
gentle arts and high-bred manners.” “ This,’
the sapient author goes on to inform us, “ is ow
ing immediately to the presence of slavery—not
only from tho immorality and coarseness which
grow out of the institution, but from the neces
sary restriction of the press, and the discourage
ment of liberal thought and speech .” And then
follows the preposterous charge, that “ there is
not a good book, in any language, which can be
admitted freely and without emasculation in the
Slave States.” A little farther on, a most deplo
rable picture is drawn of the present state of our
national affairs, and we are told that “all groat
men are sunk beneath the surface; liberty of
speeeh and of the press everywhere restricted, tho
manners of the South depraved beyond retrieval,
tho churches discredited and enfeebled”—a “ ru
inous poverty,” apparent, together with “ inca
pacity for war,” and “ conscious decline of char
acter and reputation in the world.” A pitiable
condition of affairs, truly I But how does Geor
gia, with her wealth and integrity; her magnifi
cent churches, colleges and thriving cities; her
busy and happy population, and her railroads,
that intersect her everywhere like great arteries,
through which circulate the vast streams of com
merce—how does she and her flourishing sisters
compare with the picture ?
Tho above extracts are but samples of the pro
ftise invective distributed throughout this elab
orate article of twenty-four pages, portions of
which would sound admirably in the mouth of
a Yankee abolition shrieker at a mass meeting of
“colored individuals.” Apropos, the article in
question, refers triumphantly to the “ Resolu
tions passod at a public meeting of free colored
men” in New Bedford last June, and hints that it
is the precursor of millenial times for the “ down
trodden race,” auguring their speedy elevation
to “social rights and privileges,” which means,
we suppose, amalgamation—equality and a gen
eral fraternizing of races. Save us from such a
millenium !
All this would be simply ridiculous in an ob
scure English newspaper, whose editor knew
nothing of our institutions except through the
perverted medium of such extravaganzas as Mrs.
Stowe’s romances ; but eoming, as it does, from
the highly respectable and universally respected
Edinburgh Review , it is not only absurd, but insul
ing. . M, E. B.
“Please, Mr. Seals,” writes a fair correspon
dent of our Associate, “do us the favor to per
suade your Editress to advocate the cause of her
own sex more warmly, or else pass it by alto
gether.”
We have received other intimations to the
same effect, and regret exceedingly that our well
meant efforts should have failed to give satisfac
tion to some of our fair readers.
Os course we are not so absurd as to hope to
please every body, or even to satisfy a majority.
We verily believe that, if the angel Gabriel were
to favor us with his long promised visit, we
should have some of our critics finding fault with
the cut of his wings, or his performance on the
trumpet.
But seriously, we are very sorry that our rea
ders should have misconstrued any thing we have
written. If we have alluded en passant to any
of the petty foibles that detract from the dignity
of woman’s character, it was because we believed
these to be merely incidental, and earnestly
wished to see the standard of female excellence
placed at its proper elevation. Woman has in
tellectual and moral power sufficient to overcome
tho weaknesses that have been attributed to her
sex, and not until she does this will she com
mand the universal respect and admiration of
man; she can rise superior to the foibles that
are spots on her “ original brightness ;” she can
talk well and wisely, without spicing her conver
sation with scandal; she can be learned, pretty,
accomplished without affectation ; be artistic in
dress, without giving all her thoughts to fringo
and buttons, and be a model housekeeper with
out •concentrating her mind entirely upon pie
crust and fresh butter.
It was to this that wc were endeavoring to call
your attention, illustrating all the while, very
likely, the parable of the mote afld beam, but
still, doing it, with the very best motives and
intentions. ‘M.E .B. \
THE BRIDGE OF ASPHODELS.
RY MARY E. BRYAN.
A dream-spirit bent o’er my couch last night,
And stole, with its witcher-y, my soul away.
Through my lips, half parted, it took its flight,
Asa bee escapes from a blossom of May.
Away, past the fields of cerulean space,
Where the starry blossoms like lilies shine,
Went that aiiy dream with the radiant face,
Hand in hand with this soul of mine,
’Till we paused on the archway of bright aspho
dels,
That the darksome gulf of mortality spans,
Where our spirits are carried by slumber’s spells
To grasp in brief visions the angels’ hands.
There we meet for a while with the loved and the
lost
On that shadowy, twilighted bridge of dreams,
Where the asphodels bloom, and each mist
shroudea ghost
Silently flits o’er the dark flowing stream.
But I heard not the music that, faint and afar,
Came like audible fragrance from Heaven s
fair shore; ...
And I saw not the halo, like mist round a star,
That was wreathing and floating around and
before.
For my spirit met thine on that far away spot;
My hand thrilled in thine as in meetings of yore;
I knew by thy smile that I was not forgot,
And what asked I, or hoped I, or cared I for
more ? \
The glory of Paradise lay on thy brow—
Its am’ranth were shining amid thy dark hair.
How I dared to look on thee is marvelous now,
Or breathe, save with language of praise or of
prayer.
But thy perfume-wet tresses fell low on my cheek;
Thy warm lips pressed mine as they may never
more,
And no bliss-freighted word could my tranced
lips speak,
Tho’ never was mortal so happy before.
But soon the dream-spirit unwound her weird
spells,
And, soft as a moonbeam, thou glidest away,
Scarc'e bending the asphodel’s delicate bells,
While my spirit came back to the couch where
I lay—
Came tremblingly back to its shrine in my breast,
Like a bird that has strayed into far suniiy
climes,
That, dazzled and wildered, shrinks back to its
nest,
And murmurs its pleasure in half-broken
rhymes.
But I’ve thought no more of thy far away grave,
That I never may wet with my burning tears.
(Though the cypress that over it gloomily waves
Has darkened my dreams and hopes for years.)
For, like the wild harp by the wind spirit stirred,
Or the shell, that was kissed by the sea bil
lows bright,
So my soul keeps murmuring each musical word
That fell from thy lips in our tryst last night.
. M. E. B.
VANITAS VANITATUM.
BY MARY E. BRYAN.
The Mantuan bard, in the days oi old,
Touched his harp with a hand prophetic,
And sang of the glorious age of gold,
When lapped in a bliss estatic.
Wo mortals should here with the Virtues dwell ;
(Who before were but theoretic;)
Yet, spite of seers and poets mellifluous,
We are very far, still, from that age auriferous.
Coeur de Lion's reign was a war-like age,
And Queen Annie’s was an age of Latin;
Last century, the mania was all for the stage,
But this is an age of satin ;
For, Art has driven poor Nature far
From the kingdom of “ Manhattan,”
Ami smirks in her stead, in pinchbeck pretension,
With a horrid false front and a “ double exten
sion.”
The brains have all sprouted away to moustache,
Quite after the manner of poodles,
And the aim of existence is cutting a dash,
Showing off to admiring noodles,
Polking through life with a pas de grace,
And marrying the cash ot Miss Toodles;
Whose loftiest conception of pleasure’s elysian,
Are partners in plenty and bonnets Parisian.
But all this is nothing to me, I suppose.
I care not what brains Fashion addles—
What feminines make themselves martyrs to
clothes,
And carry through life their pack-saddles;
While alone with rouged misses and musk-scen
ted fops
And such lawful game, Fashion meddles ;
But when childhood is forced into follies preco
cious -
In the hot-bed of Art, then, I say, ’tis atrocious.
Alas! that neck-aprons and sweet gingham
frocks
Should yield to fichus of French laces ;
That their hair should be tortured to corkscrew
locks,
And plastered to pale little faces ;
And in place of the healthy and hearty old games,
A French dancer should teach them the graces,
While papa cannot romp with his ownjWilhelmine
Without breaking that three-year-old’s steel
crinoline.
Time enough to rig them in gewgaws false,
And offer them up to Fashion,
For the valsiviana and midnight waltz
To engender precocious passion.
They will want all the wasted money and health
They are taught to make such a dashon ;
And besides, fair youth, with its innocent sweet
ness,
Has already too much of a fairy-like fleetness.
Oh! let them remain just as long as they please—
Our simple and frank little darlings ;
Let them play round our firesides and climb on
our knees,
Sweet and shy as young, unfledged starlings—
Not reserving their smiles for the parlor alone,
And for home their cross snappings and snarl
ings;
Yes, pray let the children teceive no expansion,
Save that which has Dame Nature’s genuine
sanction.
Let her fingers, the sweet human blossoms, ex
pand,
Without artificial inflatus;
Put the hoops—from their petticoats—into their
hands;
Discard the Schottisch and French gaiters,
And their elder sisters may do as they please;
We have satirists enough to sate us ;
And gladly I’ll leave, Saxe and Butler to rate ’em,
And din in their ears “ vanitas vanitatum.”
PRAYER FOR THE NEW YEAR.
BY MARY E. BRYAN.
Another year,
Darkly enfolding in its last embrace
This slur jering sphere,
And speeding past th( Starry isles oi space,
And past the angel h< its, its scroll has given
Into thy hand, oh! LArd of earth and Heaven.
All silent hang
The hands of seraphs on their harps of fire,
That erewhile rang
With ptEans high, thrilling each golden wire,
And Heaven's mute hosts bow thy white throne
before,
While thy dread eye readest the record o’er.
Alas! no tears
May blot the biood-hued crime-stains from that
scroll;
No sigh that sears
The parched and fevered lips through which it
stole,
May dim a single lino that there appears—
All powerless, human grief and human tears.
But thou,oh! thou!
Who wore for us the crown ot piercing thorns
On thy pure brow,
And hung beneath the darkened heavens that
morn,
When yawning graves gave up their ghostly
dead,
And Calvary shook beneath the earthquake’s
tread —
Plead for us, Lord,
As did’st thou when theiierce mob cried,
With one aecord,
“ Awaywitij. him ; let him be crucified.”
This,meek prayer only passed thy pale lips
through :
“ Father, forgive; they know not what they do.”
Father, iorgive!
Our father! thou whose holy, sovereign word
First bade us live.
The heart, whose trembling pulse thy breath has
stirred;
The soul that came from thee sends up its prayer—
A trembling dove, half fainting in mid air—
Thine eye alotte—
Thy pitying eye, oh! father, sees the prifyer
Borne to thy throne ;
Oh ! for thy son’s dear love receive it there ;
Break not the bruised reed ; to thee alone
The tried heart’s frailties, griefs and fears are
known.
Forgive the past:
We turn its blotted pages o'er, and tears
Fall thick and fast.
Its wasted days, its rashly squandered years
Fill memory’s casque—an urn of faded flowers—
And we can only weep o’er those lost hours.
Grant us thy aid ;
Thy strong hand give, that we may dare to tread,
All undismayed,
The future path before ns dimly spread.
That darksome way with unknown danger teems,
Full of vague horror, like our troubled dreams.
*****
The flush of dawn
Tints the grey clouds, like shells on ocoan’s shore.
• The breeze of morn,
A viewless spirit, steals the still earth o’er,
And wakes the wild pine’s melancholy moan—
A requiem for the year forever flown.
Thus may the morn
Ot thy millenial love in glory break,
On earth forlorn,
And Irom the lips of sorrowing ones, awake
The song that shall with heavenly choirs accc rd,
“Peaceto the earth and praises to the Lord.”
The oldest peice of furniture is the multiplica
tion table. Tt was constructed more than two
thousand years ago, and is yet as good as new.
New Series, Volume Y. —Old Series, Volume XIV. No. 1
SELECTIONS.
HIGHLAND MARY.
Thb mother of Burns’ Highland Mary, who re
sided in Greenock for & long period, died there on
the 27th of October, 1827, at the advanced age
of eighty-fiva years. This venerable looking
woman remembered, to almost the last moment
of her existence, with an affectionate regard, the
one who inspired Burns’ finest effusions, and was
the object of his purest attachment; and it was
impossible to hear her enter minutely into the
particulars of her daughter’s life, and the amia
ble qualities of her heart, without feeling con
vinced that Mary Campbell had something more
than ordinary attractions to fascinate the mind
of the poet. Were we to judge from the appear
ance of the mother, whose fine black eye, and
regular features, at her advanced age, gave indi
cations of early beauty, he would say that “High
land Mary” probably had also personal charms,
which would have influenced a less sensitive mind
than that of Robert Burns. Among the little
stores of the deceased, there was nothing to be
found as mementoes of the gifted bard, but the
Bible which he gave his beloved Mary on that
day when they met on the banks of the Ayr, “to
live one day of parting love.” It is, indeed, a
curiosity, and has written on the first leaf, in
Burns’ handwriting, the following passage of
Scripture, which is strikingly illustrative of the
poet’s feelings and circumstances : “Thou shalt
not forswear thyself, but perform unto the Lord
thino oaths.” It is well known, that after this
they never met again, and that time could not
efface the solemnity of this parting from his mind;
and it is to be regretted that two letters, which
we wrote after her death to the afflicted mother,
have been destroyed—the old woman saying,
“ she could never read them without shedding
tears.” The mother and daughter are now
sleeping in the West Church-Yard: “and is
“ Mary” to remain without a stone to tell the
stranger of her place of rest?— Teasing.
UG LI N ESS.
Ordinary persons, peradventure, may not have
remarked (what may prove a comfort to them)
that true ugliness is almost as rare a gift as true
beauty; for how very few ill-favored visages do
we encounter that possess not some redeeming
feature or expression ! I have known many an
ugly face improve ; nay, almost grow handsome,
upon acquaintance; and, indeed, although beauty
may boast of the lavish bounty of nature, ugli
ness may honestly vaunt of her plain dealing. I
am far from regarding ugliness in a woman as
unfortunate ; I rather consider it as an antidote
to vanity, and a prompter to the emulation of
goodness. And beauty, after all, (as wrinkled
old maids and “ have-beens” sagely declare,) is
but skin deep. In my boyhood, I well remember
a young man (whom I have often bad the pleas
ure of meeting) whose physiognomical posses
sions might certainly be classed under the title
of ugliness ; in sooth, he was no extra -ordinary
young man, both as respects his lineaments and
his learning. He was deep read—pale— pitted by
the small-pox, and pitied by every female wlio
beheld him. But he had a mind that minded not
their impertinent commiseration : and,-when hi3
conversational talents began gradually to be de
veloped by the genial influence of social con
verse, his opposite remarks, liis critical reading,
and his sound arguments, won all the listening
senses of his auditors ; while insipid beauty was
lost in the fluent language of eloquent ugliness.
The “ pretty men” of the party felt the unintelli
gible desertion of the fair ones, and glanced cau
tiously round at their sweet persons, reflected in
the mirrors, as they lounged listlessly about, im
agining that some alarming revolution had taken
place in their collars or cravats, or some rebel
lious lock had stretched itself ungracefully forth
from their close curled Roman crops or poodles—
. then finding all in statu quo, wildly wondered
“ what the girls could psssibly see in the fellow
to pay him so much attention V’ while others
lisped forth in a voice half strangled by their
stocks, “ I s’pose the belles are quizzing the Gor
gon !” Ugliness hath charms that pass not away
like the bloom of a summer flower ; therefore, let
not ugliness be put out of conceit. If there be
but wit and good sense behind the repulsive
mask, ugliness may even win the favor and coun
tenance of beauty.
AN INDEPENDENT WOMAN.
A lady —a youg lady, we will warrant—thus
expatiates, in tbe columns of our esteemed Buf
falo namesake, upon a very delicate topic:— Balt.
Pat.
“ A woman who loves unsought, ‘deserves the
scorn of the man she loves.”
Heaven forgive me! but may the man who
penned that never see another bonnet! May no
white dimpled arms ever encircle his cravat, or
buttons vegetate on his shirts; may no rosy lips
ever press his moustache, and the fates grant
that his dickey strings break short off every
morning; may no woman’s heart over learn to
beat faster—except with indignation=r-at the
mention of his name, and may his stockings al
ways need darning.
We feel greatly inclined to say Amen to that
prayer, horriblo as would be the condition of him
in whose behalf the lady's fervent prayer might
bo answered. But when the indignant fair one
adds: %
And when his nerves are all unstrung by dis
ease, and his head throbs with pain, as though
an earthquake were brewing in it, may he have
nothing in his sick chamber but boot-heels, and
see no one inch of muslin or calico,
Wc must hold back our assent to the maledic
tion, and dare wager our gold pen against the
largest negget California or Australia ever pro
duced, that dear Ruth herself would be the first
to hasten to the poor wretche’s sick chamber
and, with those tender ministries which reveal
the angelic nature of woman, tenderly soothe and
nurse the afflicted one.
But here is a smart hit:
Deserves scorn ? Why ? Because she gives
her love where there is no hope of a return ?
That docs look like a bad speculation; but she
has the Bible on her side. “If you love them that
ove you, what reward have you; for do not even
the Publicans so ?
And here, too, a burst of true womanly feel
ing:
Gives her love unasked I Oh! with a truo
hearted man, this would, mo thinks, be the rea
son of reasons why he should love her. She
gives to him her whole heart —for in these things
true woman does not work by halves not from
gratitude, because he loves her; not for pity or
charity, because he has begged it of her; but
because—because —dear me I it will take more
of a philosopher than I am to account for the un
deniable fact, that women do sometimes love
those horrid creatures called men. Ruth Glam
ing-
“Walk, as it were upon the border of the ocean
of eternity, and listen to the sounds of its wa
ters till you arc deaf to every other sound be
side.”
AN ENCOURAGING WORD FOR OLD MAIDS.
A writer in Tait’s Magazine says: “Mar
riage is not often the golden reality young wo
men seem to think It; neither does it so mate
rially alter the character as they would fancy.
The 1 cross old maid,’ if she had changed her
state, would have been Bimply the cross old wife.
‘The boy is father to the man;’ and the young
woman may fairly be called the prototype of the
■old one. If a woman be a cheerful member of
her own household, smoothing every difficulty in
her path, and culling happiness as the bee draws
honey, even from poison flowers, then she will
grow into that most estimable of all good beings
—a cheerful, benevolent, beneficent 1 old maid,’
an honor to the name, a glory to the sex. There
will be no repining, nor selfish regrets at what
might have been. She will take the cup that
God holds to her, and though it be not highly
spiced, raise it to His praise. Among England’s
women, thousands of such are to be found; but
they make no noise in the world, for content is
silent—discontent noisy and obtrusive. Thus,
while the offences of the spinsterhood are per
petually thrust upon us, the quiet virtues of
others pass unheeded ; and therefore the world,
judging as it always does by appearances alone,
passes judgment on the whole, and adds its mod
icum to abuse already cast on the overloaded
back of 1 old maidenism.’”
A Hard Case. —A Father’s Punishment of
a Daughter. —A well-known citizen of Boston
died recently, leaving property valued at from
$450,000 to $500,000, his disposition of which is
thus narrated by the Ledger, of that city:
“Some few years since, one of his daughters
saw fit to marry a gentleman of high moral char
acter, although poor in this world’s goods, be
longing to the marine corps ol the United States.
The father opposed the marriage, and has ever
since refused to recognise his daughter, or to do
anythipg for her. She has lived in a very hum
ble way in Newport with her family, consisting
of her husband and lour children. Learning that
her lather was very ill at the Tremont House,
and knowing that her mother and only sister were
abroad, she came to Boston, and, through a mu
tual friend, solicited the privilege and pleasure of
ministering to his comfort, and be with him in
his last moments. Her appeal was repulsed with
scorn, and she was thus deprived of the opportu
nity of doing what every right-minded woman
would seek to do under similar circumstances.
He died, and she, notwithstanding all that had
taken place, attended his funeral and saw his
mortal remains deposited in their last resting
plaee.
The will of the deceased has just been oponed,
and it is found that he has put his whole property
in trust, excepting, we believe, one legacy of ten
thousand dollars, providing for the payment to
his wife of SB,OOO per annum, and a single daugh
ter (now with her mother) and two sons fivo
thousand dollars each per annum, on the condi
tion of forfeiture if either of them ever gives one
farthing tp the married daughter. And, to meet
the requirements of law, he gives to this married
daughter the pittance of four hundred dollars per
annum, to show the relentless hostility to one of
his own blood, who saw fit to bestow her affec
tions upon one she loved.
GOD S DISCIPLINE WITH MEN.
In a time of war, when men left their dwellings,
there lay, unused, in an old mansion, a stately
instrument of music—a piauo. The dust cov
ered it, and little by little the weather contracted
and expanded it till the wood had cracked. The
different strings of the instrument were out of
tune with each other; so that not one of them
was, right. By-and-bye peace was declared, and
the long exiled owner returned to his house. On
coming home, looking about him and seeing
everything out of order, he cleansed the kitchen,
cleansed the parlor, cleansed the various rooms
through the house, and at the last he says, “ 1
will have this instrument put in order.” He
sends for a tuner, who comes and looks at it and
says, “ A noble instrument, indeed; by one of
the best makers !” He opens the lid, and the
dust flies up in clouds. “ Sadly negleetcd ; but
a noble instrument!” He looks through it, runs
through the scale, and begins to dust, to cleanse
and to tune it. Taking first the central note, oh,
how wretchedly that is out of tunfe ! But he
takes his tuning fork, and brings up the next
string, and the next, and the next; and so he goes
all through—flats and sharps and all—from top
to bottom, bringing every note up to its proper
pitch. During the time that he is correcting it,
nobody wants to stay in the room ; but by-and
by, when he has set it all right, he sits down and
tries it; and, as be begins to play, the first chord
is grand I Then, as he takes one of Beethoven’s
harmonies and begins to play, the servants run
up; the children stop in the midst of their Bport
to hear; everybody stops to listen, or comes to
the door! The people that went out of the room
come back and ask, “ What magnificent instru
ment is that? Ah, it is that wailing instrument
that drove you out! That is what it is, now
chorded ! And if it were Beethoven himself who
sat at it to play out the swelling thoughts of his
owu soul,, how majestic would those melodies
have been, and how magnificent “as an army
with banners” would have been the march of all
those accordant harmonies! Oh, you are ipt
struments of music now neglected, sadly unstrung
and discordant I God has already taken hold of
you, and brought some of the principal strings
up to concert pitch, and he is bringing One after
another to that. By and by, when men say that
your heart strings have broken, God will say
“No; it is nothing but the last touch in chord
ing.” And then, when every faculty shall have
been attuned, God shall bring joys like music
uuto your soul, such as you never thrilled to be
fore I Do not be impatient of it! Have patience
with God while he is tuning you ! By and by,
when the work is done, you shall thank God for
ever and forever, that he is willing to tako such
a shattered, wretched instrument to tune, and to
let its notes mingle with the harmonies of the
eternal world.—H. W. Beecher.
Only the Heart’s Offering Accepted. —The
other day, in walking down the street, a little
beggar boy—or one who might have begged, so
ragged was he—having discovered that I loved
flowers, came and put into my hand a faded little
sprig, which he had somewhere found. I did not
look directly at the scrawny, withered branch, but
beheld it through the medium of the boy’s heart,
seeing what he would have given, not what he
gave; and so looking, the shrivelled stem was
laden with blossoms of beauty and odor. And if
I, who am cold, selfish and ignorant, receive so
graciously the offering of a poor child, with what
tender joy must our Heavenly Father receive the
sincere tribute of his creatures, when he looks
through the medium of his infinite love and com
passion! Christ does not say, “ take the noblest
things of life, and bring them perfect to me, and
I will receive them.” Hesays: “Takethelow
est and most disagreeable thing; and if you bring
it cheerlully for my sake, it shall be to me a
flower of remembrance, and I will place it in the
book of life, and keep it forever.”— H. W. Bee
cher.