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Southern Field and Fireside. I JAMES GARDNER, 1 1 Proprietor. | VOL. 1. [For the Southern Field end Fireside.] A MEMORY. With fancy's eye again I see the sjiot where last we met, Thy fairy form, thy youthful face, and sparkling eyes of jet; Again I hear thy losing voice and feel thy kind em bra^fc,* And from this heart thine image dear, time never ran efface. Our rambles through the shaded glen do I remember well, The haunted glen, so stories said, where restless ghosts did dwell; * And hieing home at close of day, our hearts from sor row free, In mirthful songs our voices joined in simple mel ody. But all those happy days are past! Those joys for ever fled! On the green mossy slope I ne'er again shall lean my t head; These eyes shall never more behold the modest flow'rs that there Beside our woodland i>ath diffused their fragrance on the air. But I'll not mourn those pleasures past as one whose hopes are riven. For riper years have brought new joys—joys that de scend from Heaven; And when 1 bend the suppliant knee before the Throne dt Grace, I pray, dear friend, that we may meet in Heaven, our resting-place. North Carolina. Viola. i #i > -4^— —■ " - [For the Southern Field and Fireside.] FROM^^TOMI^TwnVER; OR, Scenes and Incidents of a Tour From New Orleans to New York. BY ONE or THE PASTY, ARROW XV. Louisville, Ky., Dec. 17, 1859. This city has long held a distinguished com mercial rank, and has been built up to its present stately proportions by its large and successful compiereo. Situated geographically in a com manding position on the south shore of the Ohio, it has long been the rival of Cincinnati on ovftS hand and of St. Louis on the other. Older than the former, at one period it prom ised to become the greatest metropolis of the two; but Cincinnati had the superiority of hold ing the key to the Lakes and a country to be developed of unparalleled agricultural opulence; while Germany took a fancy to make it her American Frankfort by directing thither the great Teutonic wave of her emigration. Louis ville is indebted only to the legitimate results of her trade »nd agriculture for her prosperity; and though surpassed in magnitude by her two rivals above named, is “ a city of no mean dig nity," and stands upon as sound a mercantile basis as any City in the Union. Steadily and safely she has achieved her greatness, and -her reputation is as stable as her success is meri ted. Her citizens are chiefly from the older Slave States, Virginia being nobly represented in her best society. I am constantly reminded of Baltimore and Richmond as Itraverse the streets, not from any actual resemblance iu scenery,but from a similarity of aspect and manners. The people are Southern in feeling intensely so, albe it the free soil of Indiana bounds the northern horizon of the opposite shore. But as extremes usually meet, the Kentuckians are likely to hold more firmly to their hereditary institutions in such a proximity; as the portion of the camp nearest the foe is ever the most strickly watched and warded, and the sentinels the best armed and most sleepless. The wheels of business roar hero from early morning with that grand anthem of commerce so dear to the merchant’s ear. A mercantile activity pervades all the thoroughfares, while ' the quay is lined with the great steamers that ply to New Orleans on one side. Pittsburg on the other. It presents a scene of constantly varying interest to the eye of the spectator. While we were looking,a leviathan, belching out clouds of black smoke from her tall chimnies, took her departure; laden to the guards with produce, cattle, ploughs, carriages, and all arti cles of merchandise of northern manufacture destined for the markets of the South; while groups of passengers crowded the decks! I like the Kentuckians I meet here very much. Kentucky, you must know, is “Virginia’s Wes tern daughter,” and all the best elements of the old Virginia character are re-produced in this “ Virginia of the West." The Kentuckian is “ Young Virginia, ’ with all the modern improvements. He shows this in his appearance, his manly pride, his fine looks, and his ardent love of the Old Dorainiou. One can only understand the Kentuckian by recollecting his origin. Thus regarded, the dif ference between him and his southern neighbor • the Tennesseean is at once perceived. Tennes AUGUSTA, GA., SATURDAY, APRIL 28, 1860. seeans and Kentuckians are often classed to gether in common parlance, when no two people are more diverse. Tennessee is the western daughter of N. Carolina! Now all travelers know that no States m the Confederacy differ so wide ly in the character, habits, looks, and associations of the people as Virginia and North Carolina. The citizens of the one, by an ordinary observer, would never be mistaken for those of the other! The Tenneseean is the North Carolinian western ized ! The Tennesseean’s attachment for the '“Old North Estate”, if possible, exceeds that of the full-blooded Kentuckian for the “ Old Dominion.” 1 The North Carolines have a large Gaelic element, and the State partakes of the shrewd, plain, practical intelligence of its aucient Scotch set tlers, and this feature characterizes their de scendants and colonists, the Tennesseeans, — while Virginia was colonized by English cava liers and is purely an English country; and the Kentuckian is the modern English cavalier, with a good deal of Johu Bull in the sturdy manliness of his character. Hence, no two States are more unlike than Kentucky and Tennessee in population, tastes, manners and customs, and aspects of the people. The Kentuckian is a tall biit fleshy man,and remarkably well-made, while the Tennesseean is equally tall, but thin and . spare. Both people are equally brave in battle; and the Tennesseean Scotch blood once 'ipon the field, no foe can stand before his rifle! Kentucky is full of fine looking men, especi i ally in the agricultural districts; and the women of Kentucky are among the most beautiful in ■ the world, and distinguished for their superior height and graceful carriage. The Major commented upon this as we prom enaded the streets, in which, as it was an unu sually brilliant day, we met a large number out shopping. We also saw several very elegant and well got-up equipages. Farther south we had seen sixteen hundred dollar carriages, driv en by a negro with a torn hat, and hole in. his jacket, and looking as if he had just been caught with a lasso out of the cotton field and placed on the box for the nonce. But here we observ ed the nice “appointment” which marks the Virginian in his “ turn-out.” The incongruity of a ragged driver to a costly carriage is one deserving rebuke: but in some of the cotton States the ladies think a fine carriage compen sates for a ragamuffin of a coachman! Livery ought to be worn by all drivers and footmen when on duty. Some may call this aristocracy. I call it simply propriety and good taste. This is the city which the genius of Amelia and the wit of Prentice have rendered celebrated in the eyes of all who read. The graceful and talented Poetess lives no longer on earth, save in the sweet memories of the thousand conge nial hearts where she has been enshrined, through thepporerw r er of her genius, over human sympathies. What marble so imperishable as to be remembered by the appreciating; and, when tho appreciating die, to carry with the soul the memory still into the life of eternity 1 Immortality is possible for man ; for, while the memory exists, its shrines will remain. Shak speare will be remembered by'myriads for my riads of ages! This is immortality. To be car ried over the grave into eternity and never be lost there, this is the birthright and reward of ge nius. And not only does genius confer a life ever lasting on its possessor, by uniting its memories with those whose lives are everlasting; but it immortalizes places on earth! We visit Europe, but not to see its houses and palaces and temples 1 These do not give immortality to cities; but to stawl where genius has stood and consecrated the place 1 Shakspeare, . Scott, Burns, Woodsworth confer immortality on tow’ns, landscapes and lakes! Alas, in this land, infant History has hardly learned to han dle the chisel or grave the marble. Yet already Washington has immortalized Mount Vernon; Jackson, the Hermitage; Clay, Ashland; Frank lin, Boston; and so on for many other names and places. My first thought, when I come to a town, is, “What man or men has consecrated, this place ? Whose genius has historified it ? Who of the past has left his spirit in the air ? What mighty ghost of the past walks its streets? Who is the genus \ocit Where are its immortal gods? its poets, painters, orators, statesmen, martyrs aud heroes ? Where were they born ? In what street —in what house?' Where do they lie in the grave yard ? What places were they indi vidually associated with in their lives ? If the town has no civic Pentes —no dead heroes of the ages, whether of sword or pen. it is to me so much brick and mortar, so many lines and angles! Towns and cities must have souls to live, and these souls are their mighty dead 1 Therefore, every city and town of any impor tance should have for the intelligent traveler a “Guide Book." a key to the places historically worthy of attention—should keep a record of all that can give it glory or interest in the eyes of strangers 1 When I was a lad, I was a week in Philadelphia, and knew not that Franklin lay buried within a stone’s throw of the Merchant s Hotel, where I stopped, until I had reached Bal timore; and so vexed and disappointed was I at not knowing it earlier, I would have gone back, if time had permitted, to have seen his grave! At the Galt House I asked the polite clerk or landlord what there was worthy of attention to a stranger in his city? what historical incidents ? He named the churches, steamboats, the chief edifices. Ac., but knew nothing of the past. If he could' have told of an old inn where Daniel Boone once ate his dinner, I should have been more pleased than to visit all the modern edi fices, beautiful and grand though they be, as well as numerous. I tried to recollect who were the literary people; but, as usual, when one gets to a place and wishes to see persons and places thought of before leaving home, they can never recall them. But who can visit Louisville without think ing of the great editorial wit whose name is a synonym for keen sarcasm ? The Editor of the Journal , and the Editor of the Boston Post, Col. Greene, are the acknowledged wits of the Amer ican Press. Their humor is of different metal, but tho edges of their weapons are equally keen and merciless. The latter has more humor, the former the most irony. The rest of the Edito rial fraternity, with all their talent, and wit too, recognize without dispute these gentlemen as Imperatores among wits of the Press. Mr. Prentice is a large man, with a colossal brain, £ ponderous-headed giant, his brow look ing like a castle of intellect. He has a grave and quiet manner, and one would be more likely to take him for at Johnsonian Doctor of Laws than for the graceful poet, political writer, and true wit he is. Thero are many very elegant streets in this city, and a certain opulent and tasteful air in the residences that reveals a highly cultivated soci ety, which I regret wo had but little opportunity to mingle with. At our hotel were several charming Kentucky families, and as some of them were friends of the fair Louisiana widow, I had the pleasure of lorming their acquaintance. Among them was one of the most charming singers and performers on the piano I ever hoard. She entertained us after tea with all the graces and riches of song one expects to find only in the opera house. The Major, whose weak side is music, and whose supreme weakness is the flute, fell incon tinently in love with her. In an evil moment, he confessed he could “do a little something on the flute!” He hastened to his room for it, and brought it into the drawing room. But I must not expose the failure of my remote relative. Wantofhreath was the trouble! His haste in as cending and descending the Jacob V-ladder of hotel Btairs, not having wings but much flesh, put him out of wind; and after several despe rate attempts to play “Oft in the Stilly Night” to the beautiful Kentucky girl’s accompaniment, he wiped his brows in mingled shame and des pair, and looked daggers at Tim, who was laugh ing at him under his white eye-laslies, while the widow, in kindly and sympathizing tone, said to the company: “ I am sure Major Bedott plays very skilfully on the flute I but, one is not always in tune, you know 1 Sometimes I can never bring any music out of the keys of the piano. We must all fail, sometimes. Major!” A word of kindness fitly spoken is a cordial to wounded vanity. The Major’s countenance changed. He looked as if he was proud of his failure, which had been so sweetly defended.— , It elevated himself in the eyes of himself. He was glad he had failed; as, if he not, he should have had no such soothing balm. “ Poyns,” he said aside to me, with exultation, “I would cut my little finger off for the pleasure of having her bind it up. I would be willing, sir —yes, sir, would be willling, as the poem said, ‘To die In aromatic pain’ by her hand.” “ I fear, Major, you’ll die by her hand, yet 1 You can never win herl You grow thin. Your whiskers have got a depressed, hang look to them, and no longer bristle as they did, a la militaire, when we left New Orleans. You are sighing half the time like a cracked bag-pipe, and have lost your appetite, and are good for nothing 1 Neither wig nor bald pate, black nor blue whiskers, avail your suit . I advise you to abandon the field!” This was spoken aside, near the door, under a battery of the fair Kentuckian’s “march in Der Preischutz;’’ for one can talk wonderfully well under the mask of a stormy piece well thumped. “ Never, Poyns, never!” answered the Major, with his broad hand laid upon his heart! — ( “ She is free I Sixty Nubians, and a league of sugar cane 1 I love her to despair I If Tim were at the bottom of the Red Sea with old Pharaoh, all would be well enough 1 But ugly as the imp is, he has a sort of Harry Clay (the ugliest man that ever 1 saw, and Tim looks like him), way of beguiling and pleasing the ladies! The widow knows he’ll be rich, and she is young and can wait till he is one-and-twenty. I wish, Poyns, you’d manage to have him left behind! If I’d known this young, unfledged chick would have got to be such an eagle. I’d left him among his Barritarian bayous and lagoons before I would have taken him under my goose’s wing to New York. Unsophisticated! An old head, sir 1 I shall caution the widow, sir 1 He’s dan • gerous! See that, sir I . They are both sing ing out of the same book, and she looks as hap py, the mischievous thing, as if it was Prince Albert I No, sir! If I had him out ol the way, I’d marry her as soon as I got to New York 1" The entrance of a party of guests interrupted our conversation and Tim’s song. We leave this pleasant city to-day noon on a superb steamer. The ice is running in the river, but navigation Is yet open for three hundred miles up. *1 have met several very agreoablo peoplo here ; and was surprised to see a New Orleans friend but three days -from that city, tin Jack son, Miss., Holly Springs and Nashville. Louis ville is uow, by rail, in direct communication with Charleston, Augusta, Memphis, and St. Louis; and soon will be with Mobile, when their great road cuts the Memphis «t Charleston. In leaving this fair city. I carry away with me pleasant recollections of the hospitality and courtesy of the citizens it has been my privilege to meet. Citizens of New Orleans, with which Louisville trades so largely, are in great favor here, and many the first families here pass the gay season in the elegant metropolis of Louisiana. Au revoir. [For the Southern Field i»nd Fireside.] SCIENCE—A NEPENTHE. BY UAKY B, BKYAK. Once, when the calm of an Indian summer sunset mocked the wild unrest of my soul, I went out to tread the crisp leaves of the hills and feel the wind upon my forehead. Down, where the brook glides through the rushes noiseless as a dream, and the Tillandsia hangs its mourning banner from the live oak trees, Al lan, the recluse, sat before his cottage, and the sunset fell upon his white hair and snowy beard, and upon the open look before him. Marl and pebbles, gathered in his evening walk, lay on the stone seat beside him. and he heard not thedrono of the bees fresh from the heart of the late-blossomed gentians, ttor yet my footslops, rustling the loug grass, for his mind was intent upon his studies. I leaned over the low paling and laid a rare dower upon his page, lie smiled and raised his mild blue eyes to my face.— The heavens above me were not more serene and cloudless. “ Father Allan,” I said, “ the cottage looks gloomy in the autumn time: are you not lonely here ?” “ Nay," he answered, “ I have pleasant com panions—my thoughts and these," —aud lie laid his hand upon the book und looked around upon beautiful Nature. The calm lips, the sereue eyes, moved me with a feeling almost of envy. Obedient to a quick impulse, I spoke again: “ Father Allan, Fate has held her bitterest cup to your lips. Death and poverty have made your old age solitary and destitute; and yet your eyes are depths of calm. Are you, then, happy ?” Aud lie answered in his low, sweet, measured voice, “ I have attained peace.’ 1 Peace 1 The word was music to my disturbed spirit. “Peace ft sweeter than happiness, father,” I cried; “ teach me how to attain it. Teach me the secret of your sublime indifference to mis fortune. What is there on earth that can make us forget odr selves ?” “Science,” he answered, aud turned again to the book before him, whilo I passed on, feeling that I had been mocked and baffled. But the years that since then have passed over me have brought more knowledge. 1 have turned a page—the initial page —in the book of Science, then sealed to me, and I know that the old recluse spoke truly. Science and philosophy are the nepenthe of the mind, for Aey abstract it from the contemplation of its individual cares; they lift it above the low atmosphere of sell, en large the scope of its vision, and bid its thoughts revolve in a wider orbit than that of mere per sonal existence. They bumble the pride of man and teach him bis own insignificance when com pared with the wonders of the Universe. Be side the grand truths of science, his petty joys and hopes and sorrows dwindle into nothing ness ; beside the incalculable ages that have passed over the earth, and left their footprints for science to reveal, the transient years of hu mau existence seem but as grains of sand thrown off the whirling wheel of Time. I no more at the calm philosophy of 1 those who have drank from this magic fountain '’—at their indifference to paiu, and poverty, and misfortune. I marvel no more at Socrates, list ening with unruffled brow to the tirades of Xau tippe—nor at Galileo, deeming threatened death a trifle in the presence of that sublime truth lie embodied in the immortal words “ E pur si muove.” The vision of science is telescopian —sweep- ing far, and high, and wide. She sends Thought from sphere to sphere, from system to system in yonder realm of space, where countless suns are burning, and worlds innumerable are wheel ing in their orbits. Placing the mind in the centre of a Universe too vast for human concep- I tion to embrace its exteut. —she bids it see its j Two Dollars Per Annnm, I | Always In Advance. I own small planet among the myriads of grander worlds—a scarce pcrceptiblo link in the great chain of creation —an atom of golden dust sha ken from the feet of God when lie walked through space in the mysterious dawn of Time. Then, leaving the constellated worlds above us, Science seeks the one on which we tread; and, by the light of her torch, she leads us down into its subterranean galleries, and unveils the pictures of the past that hang upon their walls. Here are preserved the archives of ages and cycles of bygone Time, and science reads the hieroglyphic records. Every “ period ” has left its memorial; from that in which deep called unto deep, and no voice of life broke upon the wild music of the w.aters, down, through un numbered centuries, to the present epoch. As we contemplate these records, stamped in delibly upon the palimpsest of the earth, Thought rolls back through the seeming eternity of the past, and the world, which we vainly fancy made for us slope, is seen as the home and the grave of millions of be>ngs who lived and perished before the advent of man—huge animals, whose size would now be to us terri fically monstrous, whose tread shook the gigantic forests of fern and whose voice rolled thunder ously through the valleys—monsters of the sea, birds and reptiles, of whose vast proportions our minds can with difficulty lorm the idea. All are now extinct—the species swept wholly from existence, while the earth, like a kaleidoscope, turned slowly in thf lands of Time, shows up on Its' irrrface new A>rb.i>, new and new modes of animal and vegetable life. Such glances down the shadowy vista of the past, wierdly lighted by the lamp of Science, make the period of human existence appear the veriest span; and individual life seems insignifi cant when we know that the earth, of which we boast ourselves the lords, is but a mighty sepal- - chre, formed in part of its own accumulated dead. Man himself, from first to last, is in the eye of Science but the predominant and distin guishing animal of an epoch; and the period al lotted to the whole humau race in which to play out their drama of life and death on the change ful stage of the world, Science may designate as the “Homoferous or lyan-beariug period,” and— judging the future by the past —predict that, in the corns; of ages, man, like the snimals preced ing him, would be swept from the face of the earth, the species become extinct—the type only being preserved in fossil—while a new, aud (in accordance with the law of the ascending scale of being) a higher form of life would occupy the world, aud tread above the graves of extinct humanity. Said I, that the tendency of Science is to make man feel his own insignificance ? Not so. The extended views of the Universe which Science opens to the mind of man, tend, indeed, by elevating his. thoughts, to lessen the apparent magnitude of the cares and misfortunes that are incident to human life: but oflifeiuthe abstract —of the soul, which is the principle of life, Scienco gives man the loftiest conceptions. It gives him a view—imperfect indeed, but Btill grand and broadr—of the plan and perfection of the Universe, and he feels his own importance as an integral part of this sublime whole—the harmony of which would be destroyed were the smallest part to be wanting. In* the mighty Harp of Creation, whose golden chords are the worlds that fill the immensity of space, every sentient, every inanimate thing contributes to perfect tlio music that sounds harmoniously in in the ears of its Creator, aud not the frailest string could be broken or removed, without im pairing the melody of the whole. - The Genuineness or Paintings.—The diffi culty of determining the genuineness of pictures is strikingly shown by the following incident related by Mr. Hogarth, the eminent print publisher in the Hay market: Some years since I purchased a picture at Christie’s, sold as a genuine production by Mul ler, of an ‘ltalian Boy’; it was signed and dated. Mullersaw the picture several times at my house, and never hesitated to acknowledge its being painted by himself. Goorge Fripp, of the Water-Color Society, also saw and re marked : ‘You have got Sphinx’s picture (a nick name given to Muller). I saw him paint it.’ This picture I sold to one of the trade at Cam bridge ; and, as Muller’s reputation rapidly in creased, the picture passed quickly into other hands. One of these persons wrote to Muller, asking if it was his work. ‘lf it is the same picture Mr. Hogarth had, I painted it’ The picture upon this was again sold, and sometime after taken to Muller to verify, which he did; his brother, however, who was present, looked at the canvas and exclaimed: ‘Bill, this can’t be your picture; don’t you remember it had a sketch at the back ?’ This caused a closer ex amination, and it was found to be a copy. Os course, the picture no loDger possessed the value in the eyes of its previous possessors, and it came back to me. In almost the last letter I received from Muller, he alludes to this transac tion, and says: “I found out all about the ‘ltalian Boy.’ I painted the picture for Mr. , and he had six copies made from it, and yours was * oue of them." * NO. 49.