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tions, while painting illustrates and realizes the vivid conceptions which her magic sisters have created. Who,' it may here be asked, 'can listen to the powerful language-the discriminative excellence - the inimitable personification of character and the poetical beauties, contained in our best dramatic authors, and not feel a growing expansion of intellect a progressive improvement in knowledge?'

Its power over society is so extensive, that all governments of a despotic character have dreaded its influence, unless rendered by them the engine to propagate their doctrines, or perpetuate their power. We need but refer to the rigid supervision which surrounds the acted drama, in all monarchical countries, at present, to establish the fact of its importance.

Its utility in civilized society, may also be advocated, on political grounds. In all populous cities, where commerce and industry are furnishing the means of obtaining wealth and consequent indulgence in luxury, the minds of the rich may become too absorbed in their wealth and enjoyments, and the laboring portion of community may grow dissatisfied at viewing their relative position in society, or revel in gross dissipation. What means can more effectually correct the laxity of one class, or calm the angry feelings of the other, than dramatic representations? It is recorded of Cardinal Borremeo, that upon assuming the archbishopric of Milan, he denounced theatrical amusements, closed the theatres, and banished the actors. What was the result? The people, deprived of their favorite entertainments, and thereby thrown upon their resources for recreation, rushed into the commission of the most flagrant crimes, and a total depravity of character ensued. The cardinal became sensible that the multitude must have their recreations. He restored to them their theatres, and dramatic amusements — and again society assumed a healthful tone. Somewhat similar effects may be remarked, during the extinction of theatres in the time of Cromwell. Anarchy, fanaticism, and gloomy prejudices, characterize the features of society during that period-equally detrimental to the interests of true religion as the commission of crimes which have not its name for a palliative and excuse.

Of the moral influence of the drama, and its reverse tendency, much has been written. We may safely hazard the assertion, that its moral influence is tenable, when it is under judicious regulation.

- or,

Blair has pronounced tragedy to be a high and distinguished species of composition, which in its general tendency is favorable to virtue.' He quotes also the opinion of Aristotle, who declares: Tragedy is intended to purge our passions, by the means of pity and terror,' in other words, to improve and correct our lives. That such might be its effects, few unprejudiced minds will deny. In our rapid historical sketch of the drama, we have seen it the scourge of vice, folly, and profligacy, the inciter to, and rewarder of, patriotism, courage, and virtue, and such might still be the influence of a well-governed stage.

The best specimens of dramatic composition invariably represent virtue in favorable colors, — enriched with every beauty which sentiment and feeling can bestow. Vice is portrayed in all the hideous aspects which it is its peculiar characteristic to assume. We have exhibited before us the latent springs which prompt the wretched slave

12

Soliloquy.

of passion and malignity to barter his eternal hopes for horror and despair. We view the gradual development of crime, we shudder we rejoice at the triumph of at the final close of the guilty career, virtue and all the kindly feelings of our nature are aroused to a renewed energy of action by the glowing scenes we have beheld.

If satire be the object of the drama, how powerfully can it wield the pointed shaft! Embodying the follies it aims to correct, they are reflected with such unerring accuracy, that the most obtuse mind cannot fail to recognise the picture. In accomplishing these varied powers of drama, the whole range of created matter was within its grasp. The boundless beauties of nature have been seized upon to aid its decoration, and increase its effects, the highest efforts of poetic talent have upheld its glory, and enriched its stores, by their splendid genius, and their laurel'd fame.

These we conceive to be the broad grounds upon which the moral and intellectual influence of the drama may be advocated. Its perversion to unworthy ends we are not champion enough to defend; but we do conscientiously believe with Chesterfield, that a well-governed stage is an ornament to society, - an encourager of wit and learning, school of virtue and refinement.'

and a

H.

SOLILOQUY

OF CROMWELL, AT THE BIER OF CHARLES THE FIRST.

How calm he looks!-upon that high, clear brow
Nature hath set her seal of sovereignty.

Heir of a noble race, I envy thee!

'Twas but a blow- and thine enfranchised soul

Fled to a realm where treason hath no place;

While I with smiling enemies am girt,

And 'neath this seeming plain and peaceful garb

Must wear a gaberdine of woven steel

To shield me from their swords. Oh! would to God
Around my heart such harness could be wrought,
And Conscience shoot its arrows there in vain!

Blest is the ruler, who a nation's love

Has for his throne's foundation: but for me
Fear is the only sceptre. Those I sway
Would turn and rend me, if I awed them not.
Well, what of that! And if the slaves obey,
More merit to the mind which curbeth them.
The reins of empire did not idly drop,
By chartered custom, in my open palm:
No reverend prelate bent in mitred pomp
To place a jewelled circlet on my brow,
Or lave my head with consecrated oil.
I am mine own anointed: and although
I wear not as the type of sovereignty
A lineal bauble, I am not less a king.
Monarch, farewell! Thou sleepest peacefully
As he who planned thy ruin may not sleep.
The wrong thou hadst from me is well avenged:
Treachery without, and a still voice within,
Are its avengers. One I'm armed against-
The other, 'tis more difficult to quell;
But I can cloak it, and the vulgar herd
Who come around to flatter and to sue,

Shall still believe me the stern saint I seem.

THE LAPSE OF YEARS.

COME to thy native village,

- for 'tis sweet,

Howe'er an adept in the world's proud lore,
To turn and trace the simplest elements

Of hope and joy. See, there the favourite brook
That sped the water-wheel, and gaily bore
Thy tiny boat, and there the broader pool
Whose icy surface lur'd thee forth, to share
Exciting sport, when winter touch'd the cheek
With living crimson. Oft, yon hillock mark'd
Thy hoop's fantastic round, for still thy foot
Was fleetest in the race, and thy clear voice
Rang like a bugle, when the shout pealed high.
Thou canst not think so many years have fled,
Since those good days.

See'st thou yon clamorous band,
Hasting to school? Not one of these had touch'd
Life's threshold, when thy manly arm was strong
To crush the dangers in its pilgrim-path.

Stretch forth thy hand and touch them, if thou needst,
Like sceptic Thomas, such a proof to solve
Thy doubt. Behold that blooming creature, full
Of the sweet grace of perfect womanhood:
Didst thou not take her ofttimes in thine armis,
When scarce a few scant moons had o'er her roll'd?
Perchance, thou mayst remember how the nurse
Would snatch her from thee, for thine uncout and
Skill'd not to yield her head its full support,
And thy rough whiskered cheek, did frighten her.
Seekst thou thy playmates? There are hoary men,
And matrons bowing 'neath their lot of care,-
And some who highest bade the kite aspire,
Have lowest sank to rest. Thou canst not feel
What a stern robber Time hath been to thee;
And yet, methinks, the officious eye might trace
Some silvery tints amid thine own bright hair.

- How silently the autumn's falling leaves
Come drifting through the air. The snow-flake steals
Scarce with a lighter foot. So fleet our years.
And while we dream their greenness still survives,
Amid the remnant of their withered pride,
Our steps make sullen echo.

Yet the sheaf

Looks not with envy toward its tassel'd germ,
Nor the ripe peach bemoans its fallen flower;
Why then should man his vanish'd morn regret?
The day of duty is the day of joy,

Of highest joy, such as the heavens do bless.

So, keep perpetual summer in thy soul,
And take the spirit's smile along with thee,
Even to thy winding-sheet.

Yon lowly roof,
Thou knowst it well, and yet it seems more low
Than it was wont to seem, for thou hast been
A denizen of loftier domes, and halls

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Meet for the feet of princes. Ask thou not
For father or for mother, they who made
That humble home so beautiful to thee;
But go thy way, and show to some young heart,
The same deep love, the same unchanging zeal
Of pure example, pointing to the skies
That nurtur'd thee. So shalt thou pay the debt
To Nature's best affections and to God.

Hartford, December, 1835.

L. H. S.

A CHAPTER ON SHARKING.

WHEREIN THE author setS FORTH HOW HE WENT FASTER AND FARTHER THAN HE ANTICIPATED, and RETURNED SAFELY, NOTWITHSTANDING.

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Of all the bright sands in Time's changing kaleidoscope, the brightest are those which mark the school-boy's vacation. These are your true diamonds, evanescent indeed, yet rife with the light of joyousness; and when they have passed away forever, the memory of their loveliness lingers like a heavenly twilight upon the mind, gilding the obscurations of after years, and fading at last only with our sublunary being. These are the golden sands, to which, in the schoolboy's valuation, the treasures of Ophir are as the dust of the balance. How doth he gloat upon their pleasant sheen, as it gleams out from the nebulous horoscope! How doth his full heart sink within him, as he surveys the mass of leaden and drossy moments which must be numbered ere the transit of these brighter hours! How impatiently doth he chide their lingering fall, which realize to his hope deferred' the chronicling of an eternity! With what an itching palm' doth he long to shake the sluggish glass, and hasten the snail-paced advent of his emancipation! And when at last the gurea atas has dawned upon his expectancy, how sparkle his champaigne spirits, as he springs away, exultingly, as an uncaged bird, from the task and the tas master of his cloistered youth! Dust shall gather for a season upon his forsaken tomes -the spider shall hang his deserted chamber with her filmy tapestry - the voice of the cricket shall echo mournfully from the cheerless hearth- and loneliness inhabit the haunts of the departed. Farewell, unerring Euclid! Far different lines and angles are now traced by thy unwilling disciple, - not on the dog-eared margent, nor on the dinted black-board, the sunny waters of brook or bay, where he muses pleasantly by mossy rock or green-wood tree, or heaves passively to the gentle motion of the rocking skiff. His tangent now is the lithesome bamboo, his sine the buoyant dobber, that taketh the gauge of bite or nibble. Farewell, Mæonian bard, and Mantuan, fare-thee-well! Your recreant worshipper now woos fairer Helens and Lavinias than those embalmed in your gorgeous cerements. Farewell, star-scaling Newton! With thy reluctant votary, other orbs with their softer attractions are in the ascendant, which perchance were never recked of in thy baccalaureate philosophy. The levity of vacation doth wag the head at thy sublimer gravity. Vacation!-charm of all charms the chief! Sweet poësie of time! word from some blessed sphere to care unknown! Vacation!-bright cynosure of boyhood's laughing eye and El Dorado of its eager hopes the Mecca of its pilgrim dreams - the term-time theme of every truant thought, the synonym of all it prizes most, unbounded freedom and unfettered mirth!

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but on

But to my story, which, however piscatory, is nevertheless substantially true, and well worthy a better narrator.

It was during the last vacation of my third college year, that I found myself rusticating at the paternal residence of my chum and class-mate Ned Ashton. We were accustomed to spend these delightful holidays. alternately at our respective homes. Though Ned was several years my senior, there existed the closest intimacy between us; and as we

were always as inseparable as substance and its 'contiguity of shade,' we had acquired the appropriate soubriquet of the Siamese. But aside from our dimidial companionship, we were far from being counterparts, since Ned was six-feet-two, without stretching, while I could hardly raise a perpendicular of five-feet-four, with a tall-crowned hat, and a tiptoe to boot. Like the antitheses in the old epigram,

'He looked just like a mile in length,

And I like a mile stone.'

Nor did we differ more in altitude, than in person and complexion. I was ruddy, and of a delicate chubbiness; he, bronzed and sallow, and exceeding thin and spare withal. Yet, notwithstanding this ghostly exility of figure, in all the athletic exercises of the gymnasium, in which, by-the-by, he engaged with the keen hilarity of boyhood, he had no equal. His feats of strength and agility were alike the wonder and admiration of us all; and yet they never seemed to cost him an effort, or awaken in him one feeling of conscious superiority. I remember one day, when we were all on the gymnasium, that a stalwart sophomore from Ohio, by a powerful effort, overleapt the hitherto unattained mark which Ned had made two years before. His fellows immediately set up a boisterous shout in glorification of their classmate's triumph. Ned had been ill for several days, and we were standing aside from the melée, quietly enjoying the merriment of the various groups around us. I looked at him despairingly, as the cry of Ohio against the world!' broke from the partisans of the successful Buckeye. "Twas a gallant leap,' observed Ned, gathering up the long skirts of his slender doublet, and fetching three strides to the salient point,' he bounded like a stag full a yard beyond the ne plus ultra of his rival.

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'You've been barking up the wrong tree, this time,' cried the goodnatured Ohioan to his silent and crest-fallen applauders, and till some one of us gets his foot-handles strung with the thews of a panther, I guess we'd best let old Connecticut chalk out for us. I suspicion he's one of that bounding brotherhood, who, the Indians say, leaped over the Wabash and Mississippi as easily as a greyhound clears a log-fence.' But to return. Ned and I were vacating as I have said, at his father's charming residence, situated in one of the loveliest valleys which look out upon Long-Island Sound. It was in the latter part of September. We had been confined to the house for several days by the equinoctial storm,' during whose tempestuous and protracted transit we had overhauled our fishing appliances and rifles, and indeed set in order all the appurtenances of our other out-door amusements. This done, we sat down perforce, and waited the pleasure of the boisterous elements to release us from our impatient durance. For the equanimity we displayed on this occasion, silence were the safest eulogy. We were enfranchised at last, however, and by one of the loveliest mornings that ever dispelled the twofold dreariness of night and storm. As the sun wheeled up from behind the low woodlands of Rhode-Island, he seemed to rejoice that there was not a cloud in the whole horizon to obstruct the full tide of his glorious effulgence. The air was like a liquid and impalpable crystal, bright and clear as empyreal ether. So perfect was its translucency, that the remotest objects within the of vision, showed to the eye in all the distinctness of comparative proxi

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