peculiar interests and structure of southern population, yet, in its final issues, interweaves itself indissolubly with the peace and the hopes and the destinies of us all. If it is ever important to consider it with admonitory reference to its inevitable and its dread results, it is at this moment, above all others the most important, whilst the public mind is ruminating upon it, and before any violent or any irrevocable act has thrust it out from the forum of reason, to be discussed and decided upon the field of battle. It is now, if ever, when a threatening frown scowls and lowers upon its front, that evidence should be heard, lest an unwary judgment should let loose the sword to "slay the man that is thy fellow." Who here that asks--who here that needs to be told, that abolition is the subject meant; that subject of mon. ster omen, though perchance of pious birth-which fostered and forwarded with a wild and explosive energy, has been made to tower above every interest of party, and above every measure of policy, by putting into contest the very body and being of the state. Passing by the questions of theology and morals and con. stitutional power and private right which have been embodied with this subject, I have this only to say which my southern position, and, therefore, my keener apprehension, both as witness and victim of all its results, will enable me to say-that if it be pushed onward by those who are locally foreign to its in

last with the better discretion; do this, as thousands have done to their sorrow, and not only will the tone and courage of your mind abate, and all of its faculties gradually give way under the abandonment of its accustomed discipline, but innumerable conjectures of hypothetical evil will fill it, and visionary reasons for further and further delay will spring up in afflicting abundance on every side of you, to postpone and perplex your decision. Every moment not imperatively demanded by the necessities of self-examination and an intelligent survey of the general operations of society, every one beyond this, which is spent under the deceptive pretence of deliberation and inquiry, only aggravates your perplexity and distress, and will ultimately fasten upon your mind the distempered and incurable habit of halting and indecision. You may search and search and be no more profited withal, than the inquiring and eccentric hermit who roamed through the world, looking in all its paths with a candle in his hand for an honest man, but retired at last, wearied, disappoint ed and disheartened to his cell, where, as the fable reads, he renounced his hopes, extinguished his torch, and died in despair. Let all waywardness and caprice be dismissed from your choice, and your plan of life be definitely settled, and it is amazing to see how instantaneous is that firmness and energy which result to the mind from this single act of concentrating its purposes and powers. But delay and delay, and as no system of life is adopt-terests and its dangers, until it becomes the efficient and admited, or adopted in time, your self-control, your sense of personal value, your efficiency and your promptitude of decision are all lost: your struggles to live, to act, to play your part in society as might become you, insensibly but inevitably dwindle down into a petty and contemptible shuffle of daily expedients; and repentance, mortification, disappointment, to say nothing of positive and resulting vices, oftentimes follow after to bring up in mourn-maelstrom to engulph the Union. Be adjured, therefore, by the ful array the procession of life."

Indeed, the whole of that part of the address which is intended for the Alumni, when they shall have engaged in the active duties of social, professional and political life, abounds so much in fervid morality and glowing patriotism that we could sincerely wish it in the hands of every intelligent reader in the country. The following passage particularly ought to be read by every politician of every party in the Union, and is of more value as coming from a gentleman known to be a warm admirer and supporter of the last and present administrations of the federal government. As we are not politicians ourselves, we leave the application to others: "Public offices are trusts, pure trusts; conferred in faith for the general weal, and opposed throughout the whole range of their intendments, to all the purposes of individual advantage. To pursue them, therefore, as being in any respect whatsoever the proper subjects of traffic or private emolument-to clutch at and seize upon and apply them as the just acquisition of personal booty, is in reality to perpetrate a robbery; a robbery more wicked and worse than that which classic fable has punished with the naked rock and the gnawing vulture; nay, it is to commit simony against the state, only less criminal and less accursed in itself than that simony against heaven, which would have purchased its gifts and its powers to dishonor, defile and destroy them."

The concluding remarks of the address we cannot omit. They relate to that gloomy subject which we never approach without shuddering. If such appeals are lost upon those misguided spirits who, in the name of peace, are lighting up the fires of discord, and would, for the sake of religion, plunge society into crime and darkness, we shall despair ever reaching them through the influence of reason, and must calmly await that hour of trial which an overruling Providence may have in reserve for our country:

ted cause of some insurgent ebullition, it will be the parent, not only of unutterable calamities to us, but of certain, irretrievable and bloody undoing to themselves and to all. Let those amongst you who choose, bewail the existence of slavery as a maelstrom in the bosom of southern society; if they but touch it with prag. matical, with forbidden and infatuated hand, they render ita

weal of this and of coming ages; by our own and our childrens'
good--by all that we have and all that we hope for in the glories
of our land, to leave this subject of slavery, with every accoun
tability it may impose, every remedy it may require, every accu-
mulation of difficulty or of pressure it may reach-leave it all to
the interest and the wisdom and the conscience of those upon
whom the providence of God and the constitution of your coun
try have cast it. Leave it to them now and forever, and stop,
before stop is impossible, the furious headway of that destruc.
tive and mad philanthropy which is lighting up for the nation
itself the fires of the stake: which is rushing on, stride after
stride, to a strife and a woe that may bury us all under a harder
and wickeder slavery than any it would extinguish. Nothing
but bitterness--nothing but aggravation of heart and of lot has
been brought upon that unfortunate man whom rash and perni-
cious attempts--the promptings of this blinded and baleful
spirit--have been put forth to benefit. They have broken down
the footing he had reached, crushed the sympathies he had won,
embarrassed and accursed the fortunes they were interposed to
control. The generous and elevating influence of our free insti
tutions was relaxing his bondage, bettering his condition, lilti g
up his character, turning upon him the public anxieties and the
public councils as a great object of provident and public pro-
vision--was changing at all points the aspects of his fate, when
a spirit, sent of heaven as it insanely imagined, came from
abroad, to scourge him with demon visitation; to wrench him
from the arms of his only true and only capable benefactors--to
throw him back again upon the earth a thousand fold more sus-
pected and more separated than before; rivetting upon him
every fetter it would loosen--poisoning every blessing it would
bestow, and filling his whole case with elements of hopelessness,
explosion and evil, which the heart sorrows whilst it shudders
to think upon. Why, then, persist? Why abet the growth or
the daring or the power of a spirit, which wisdom and mercy
plead to you, with all their tongues, to silence and to stop? Will
any daughter in this assembly, the cherished and defended
of a parent's love; blessed to the uttermost with the holy peace
of perfect security; sheltered to the uttermost from the appre
hension and the approach of every wrong; with no enemy to
dread, no hand to injure, no terror to affright; safe in het repose,
safe in her innocence at every hour and in every place; will she
do that, which, all-valueless for its objects, will yet be all-pow-
erful to send wakefulness and watching and danger and anguish,

"I shall be pardoned, I trust, by this audience, already taxed too long, for introducing, in connection with this view of a pat-perchance, to the days and the nights; to the summer shade as riot's duty, and as an appropriate appendage to it, a closing remark upon an all-engrossing and all-pervading subject, which deeply, intensely, and sternly involves it-a subject which, though it takes hold more immediately and more totally of the

well as to the barred and bolted chamber of her southern sister? Will any mother here, as she soothes her infant to its rest, and looks upon its balmy sleep, and pressing it to her heart, bows in gratitude to God for his mercies to her child, thanking him that

its life is safe, safe from harm, from the hand of violence and re- in arm to share with you in a common glory, and perish, when venge, and that all its slumbers are guarded by a nation's power: perish she must, only upon a common field :---thus testifying, will she--ob, can she, as the consequence of her acts, bear to be-through all time, to a fidelity which there was nothing in life that hold the southern mother startling and shuddering, at every foot fall, and at every noise which breaks upon the silence of the night, and flying from her pillow of wakefulness and wretchedness to kneel and crouch upon the cradle, weeping and sobbing in the agony of her soul over the murder and the horror that surround it? Will the father and the citizen hail us and greet us and press us to their bosom, as better brethren and better men, when we shall come up with our hands all red and reeking with the blood they have made us shed? But if not, then abjure the cause which involves the crime, and the disciples who support it! Friends of the slave! they are stripping him of the wretched remnant of liberty he has left. Friends of humanity! they are cruelly and recklessly staking it upon means of massacre and convulsion. Friends of the country! they are rapidly becoming its iron homicides--cleaving down its institutions with murderous band, and tearing it limb from limb. If you would see the practical working of the spirit that is spoken of--the woe and the ruin it can occasion-go to the quiet and the passive slave of the south, pour your insurrectionary sentiments into his ear, parade the worst of his condition in artful and in pictured horror before his eye, then trace the progress of the poison-trace it through bis murmurs, his resentment, his resistance; his passions grow. ing deeper and darker at every step, under the discipline he pro vokes, unul anger and ulceration and agony of spirit have done their work, and revenge and murder have become the companions of his bosom: then see him leagued and banded with others as fell and as furious as himself, the vulture at his heart,

could shock, and nothing in death that could destroy. Turning her eye and her heart upon no other banner than the proud one which floats from the capitol of the republic, she prays as she looks upon it with its "stars and stripes," that the glad shout which centuries hence may hail it in the land of the pilgrims, may be echoed back from the waves of the Pacific seas. Heaven grant that generations and ages hence, soine future son of the south, honored and welcomed and greeted as I have been today, may stand upon this consecrated spot, praising and thanking God, as I do, that he also can say, "these are my brethren, and this, this too is my country."

the dagger and the torch in his hand, stealing into the silent and
midnight chamber, and standing, with horrid and uplifted wea-
pon, over the parent and the child as they slumber for the blow:
see him-let the shriek, the gasping struggle, the gory blade,
the blazing dwelling, tell out the deed that is done. For one
moment-one palsied moment-a shivering and convulsive hor-
Tor seizes upon the hearts of millions of our people--in the next,
a dreadful wrath drives on to a dreadful retribution. But if the
blood of our people is ever thus to stream in our dwellings, and
Doze from the very bosom of the soil that feeds us, it will cry
from the ground like that of Abel for vengeance, vengeance
against the brother hand that shed it, and vengeance would be
had, though every drop that was left should be poured out in one
anguished and dying effort to obtain it. Nothing--no nothing
but heaven could prevent a people, so lashed up to frenzy by
rage and suffering and wrong, from pouring back, upon
fields and firesides of the guilty, that visitation of calamity and
death which had been sent to desolate their own. Spare us--oh,
spare as the curse of a ruptured brotherhood, of a ruined, ruined
country. Give up your happy and united country; give it up to
the madness of some factious hour, to the frenzy of some fanatic
spirit; let it sink overwhelmed in some horrible struggle of
brother with brother, and you will recover its liberties and its
blessings again, when the sun shall" slumber in the cloud, for-
getful of the voice of the morning ;"

"When earth's cities have no sound nor tread,
And ships are drifting with the dead,
To shores where all is dumb."

the

Here upon your northern fields it was, at some dark and dismaying period of our revolution, when army after army had been lost, when wretched and dispirited and beaten, the boldest quailed, the faithfullest despaired, and all, for an instant, seemed to be conquered except the unconquerable will of our glorious chief: here it was, that rising above all the auguries and the terrors around him, he exclaimed to the despairing of his follow. ers as if inspired of Heaven for his work, "Strip me of the wretched and the suffering remnant of my soldiers--take from me all I have left-leave me but a standard--give me but the means of planting it upon the mountains of West Augusta, and I will yet draw around me the men who will lift up their bleeding country from the dust and set her free." That" West Augusta" stands here to-day pleading through me, who am a son, for the individual and unbroken heritage of Washington and his comrades. Loyal to the result as to the struggle of the revolu tion-devoted, as when her devotion was counted upon equivalent to fate-true, as when you were grasped and bound to the bosom of each other in the hour of distress, it is her hope and her wish to finish with you the destinies of the nation--arm

as

THE IDIOT BOY.

BY MISS E. H. STOCKTON.

Strangers would pause, with admiration gazing
Upon the features in their perfect mould;-
The soft, dark eyes, their lids so meekly raising-
The ivory brow beneath its curls of gold.
The face was of a child-though bud and blossom,
For fifteen summers had enwreathed his home,
Still leaned his head upon his mother's bosom,

Still with his hand in her's he loved to roam.

Slight was his form, yet graceful in its motion,
And sweet the voice that breathed one word alone;
And that-oh who that feels a child's devotion,
But knows his mother's was that dearest one?
And she-her soul was full to overflowing,

Of wild and passionate tenderness for him,
But on his image every thought bestowing
From early morning to the twilight dim.
He held a silent sympathy with nature,

And with a strange, sweet smile would gaze around,
And joy, like light, would brighten every feature,
When in some mossy cleft a flower he found.
The wild-bird in the shady forest singing-
The dream-like music of the southern breeze-
The butterfly its sunny pathway winging,-
Each had a charm the gentle boy to please.

He had no memory of days departed,

His thoughts like rosy shadows came and went--
He was not one of those, the weary-hearted—
Who gaze with sorrow on a life misspent.
Each time when winter came with sombre vesture,
And he beheld the feathery flakes of snow,
He hailed them with the same astonished gesture,
Nor knew that he had seen it long ago.

And still, with every little new-found treasure,
His hasty footsteps to his mother led;
Clasped in her arms he knew a sweeter pleasure,
Than he who feels a crown upon his head.
Poor and a widow was that lonely mother,

And by her daily labor fed her child;
Yet there was no one knew her but to love her ;'
She was so gentle and to all so mild.

At last the messenger of death appearing,

Gave warning that the mother's hour was nigh,

"Mother!"-how like a bird's the note came sounding, NOTICE TO THE REVIEWER OF "NEW VIEWS OF From the red, parted lips that smiled with joy; As, with his wonted step of airy bounding,

PUBLISHED MONTHLY AT FIVE DOLLARS PER ANNUM-THOMAS W. WHITE, EDITOR AND PROPRIETOR.

THE TRANSFIGURED:

A TALE FROM THE GERMAN.

No. IV.

what?" I again proceeded onwards, towards the dark mountains, which rose before me in clouds and rain.

I had but little money in my pocket, scarcely sufficient to reach Vienna, unless I begged on the way, or The following tale is translated for the Southern Literary should sell either my watch, linen or better clothes, Messenger, by a lady of Pennsylvania, from the German of which I carried in a knapsack. The finest years of Tachokke, published a few years since. The chief design of my youth I had passed in Italy, in order to improve the author seems to have been to illustrate the German philoso-myself in painting and sculpture. At last I advanced phy of Animal Magnetism; in the course of which he endea. vors to explain some curious, not to say mystical, metaphysical speculations. The learned may find something in them for rereflection, while the lovers of romance will be better pleased with a very ingenious story, diversified with several interesting characters and exciting incidents, drawn with great power and rich coloring. The whole is thoroughly German, both in its beauties and defects. As the subject of Animal Magnetism, engages, at this time, a good deal of attention, and has enlisted in its behalf some of our men of science, the publication of this exposition of its theories and mysteries may be peculiarly ac

ceptable.-Ed. So. Lit. Mess.

sufficiently in my art to discover, in my twenty-seventh year, that I should never accomplish anything really great. It is true my Roman friends had often had the kindness to encourage me. Many of my pieces Nevertheless this gave had occasionally sold well. me but little comfort. I could not but despise creations which gave me no satisfaction. I experienced the painful feeling, that I was and should remain too weak to call into life with pencil or chisel the living conceptions within me. This threw me into despair--I The charm, elegance and retirement of the villa, wished not for money-I longed only for the power of the hospitality of our rich host, Ambrosio Faustino, art; I cursed my lost years and returned to Germany. and the grace of his most lovely wife, contributed not At that time I still had friends there: I longed for a a little to the healing of our wounds, received in the solitude, where I could forget myself. I would become battle of Molito, (we were four German officers,) but a village schoolmaster, or engage in any humble emstill more the pleasing discovery, that both the gene-ployment, in order to punish my bold ambition, which rous Faustino and his beautiful wife were of German had attempted to rival Raphael and Angelo. descent. He was formerly called Faust, and was, by a singular chain of circumstances, induced to settle in Italy and to change his name. The delight of being abie, far from our native land, to exchange German words, made us mutually confidential.

What

The rainy weather had already continued several days and increased my uncomfortable feelings. The thought frequently awoke in me, if I could but die! A fresh shower drew me aside from the road, under a tree. There I long sat upon a rock, looking back with deep melancholy upon the destroyed plans and hopes of my life. I saw myself, solitary, amidst wild mountains. The cold rain fell in streams. Not far from me a swollen torrent roared through the rocks. will become of me? sighed I. I looked at the torrent, to see whether it were deep enough to drown me if I threw myself in. I was vexed that I had not already made an end of my sufferings at Tagliamento. Suddenly an unspeakable anguish and the "Read it," said he, "and believe me, however in-pangs of death seized me. I shuddered at my resolucredible it may appear, it is true. Even to myself, it tions and wishes. I sprang up and ran on in the rain, seems at times a deception of the imagination, though as if I would escape from myself. It was already evenI bave experienced it all." ing and becoming late.

I had the liberty of passing my morning hours in Faustino's library. There I found in magnificent rows the choicest works, and also some volumes of Italian manuscripts, written by Faustino. They were memoirs of his own life, mingled with observations on painting and sculpture. I asked the favor of being permitted to read them, which Faustino was not only good enough to grant, but also drew out one of the volumes and pointed out what I should read.

He also imparted to me many smaller circumstances. But this is sufficient for an introduction. Here follows the fragment from Faustino's or rather Faust's

memoirs.

ADVENTURE IN VENZONI.

I came to a single large house not far from Venzoni. The increasing darkness, continued rain, and my own fatigue, induced me to stop at this building, which

exhibited the friendly and inviting sign of accommodation for travellers. As I passed the threshold of the door, a violent shuddering and the same mortal agony

On the twelfth of September, 1771, I crossed the seized me, that I had experienced whilst sitting on the

stream Tagliamento at

Spilemberg. I approached with

firm steps the German confines, which I had not seen breath, but quickly recovered myself. I felt lighter for many years. My soul was full of an indescribable than I had for some days, when in the warm public melancholy, and it seemed as if an invisible power drew room I again felt the breath of man. me back. It constantly cried to me, return. In fact, it had been merely an attack of bodily weakness.

rock in the wood. I remained at the door to take

twice did I stop on the wretched road, looked towards

Without doubt

They welcomed me, and I cheerfully threw my knap

Italy, and wished to return again to Venice! But then, sack on the table. I was shown a small room where when I asked myself, "what argues it? to live! for I could change my wet clothes. Whilst undressing, I

VOL. V.-29

heard a quick step on the stairs; the room door opened, | paradise,-can scarcely be more beautiful; but I believe and some hasty questions were asked about me, such as her father has united her with the devil. Jesu Maria! whether I should remain over night--if I came on foot what was that?" and carried a knapsack--if I had light hair; and many more of a like nature. The interrogators went away-became deadly pale. It was nothing but a window came again, and another voice asked similar questions. I knew not what it meant.

The frightened Sebald started from his seat and

shutter, dashed violently too by the wind and rain. After I had tranquillized my companion, he continued: When I returned to the public room, all eyes ex- "It is no wonder; one must live in constant fear of amined me with curiosity. I seated myself as if I death. One of us must and will shortly die! That I remarked nothing. Yet I was tormented to discover have heard from the young woman Catharine. God be wherefore any one had made such particular inquiries merciful to me! May I not, in the mean time, with my about me. I led the discourse to the weather--from comrade Thomas, refresh myself with wine? Sir, there the weather to travelling, and from thence to the inquiry, is no want of what we desire, to eat, to drink, nor of if any more strangers were in the house. I was inform-money; we fail only in a happy mind. I should long ed that there was a noble family from Germany, con- since have run off―." sisting of an old gentleman and a very beautiful and sick young lady, an elderly lady, probably the mother of the young one, a physician, two servants and two maids. The party arrived at mid-day, and had been detained, partly by the badness of the weather and partly by the weakness of the young lady. I learnt, besides, that both the physician and the old gentleman had come into the public room, in great haste, and had inquired with some anxiety and astonishment about me. The host was certain that the party knew me well. He urged me to go up, as I should certainly meet old friends and acquaintances, since they appeared to expect me. I shook my head, convinced that there was some mistake. In the whole world I had no noble acquaintances, and least of all could I claim any of the German nobility. What confirmed me still more in this belief, was that an old servant of the Count came in, seated him self at the table near me, and in broken Italian called for wine. When I addressed him in German, he was delighted to hear his native tongue. He now related to me all that he knew of his master. The gentleman was a Count Hormegg, who was carrying his daughter to Italy for change of air.

The more the old man drank, the more talkative he became. At first, he had seated himself gloomily by me; at the second flask, he breathed more freely. As I said to him, that I thought of going back to Germany, he sighed deeply, looked towards Heaven, and his eyes filled with tears. "Could I only go with you! could I only go!" said he sorrowfully and softly to me. "I can bear it no longer. I believe a curse rests on this family. Strange things occur amongst them. I dare confide them to no one, and if I dare, sir, who would believe me?"

THE MELANCHOLY COMPANY OF TRAVELLERS.

By the third flask of wine, Sebald, for so he was called, became openhearted. "Countryman," said he, and he looked timidly round the room; but no one was present but ourselves; we were sitting alone by the dim burning candles. "Countryman, they cannot blind

me. Here is a curse under the veil and abundance of riches-here rules the bad spirit himself; God be merciful unto us! The Count is immensely rich, but he creeps along like a poor sinner; he is seldom heard to speak, and is never gay. The old lady, companion, governess, or something of that kind, to the Countess Hortensia, appears to be in constant fear, from a bad conscience. The Countess herself,-truly a child of

Sebald's fable appeared to me to be full of his wine. "From what do you infer that one of you must die?" "There is nothing to infer," replied Sebald: "it is only too certain. The Countess Hortensia has said it, but no one dares speak of it. Look you-at Judenberg, fourteen days ago, we had the same story. The young Countess announced the death of one of us. Being all in good health, we did not believe it. But as we were proceeding on the highway, Mr. Muller, the secretary of the Count, a man generally beloved, suddenly fell, together with his horse and baggage, from the height of the road, over the rocks, into the abyss beneath, ten times deeper than the church steeple. Jesu Maria! what a spectacle! Hearing and sight left me. Man and horse lay shattered to pieces. When you pass through the village where he lies buried, the people will relate it to you. I dare not think of it. The only question now is, which of us is to be the next victim? But if it comes to pass, by my poor soul, I will demand my discharge from the Count. There is something wrong here; I love my old neck, and do not wish to break it in the service of the God-forsaken.”

I smiled at his superstitious distress, but he swore stoutly, and whispered: "The Countess Hortensia is possessed by a legion of devils. For a year she has frequently run over the roof of the castle Hormegger, as we scarcely could do on level ground. She prophe sies; she often, unexpectedly, falls into a trance and sees the heavens open; she looks into the interior of the human body. Dr. Walter, who is certainly an honest man, affirms that she can not only see through people as if they were glass, but also through doors and walls. It is horrible. In her rational hours, she is very sensible. But, oh God, it is in her irrational hours that she governs us, when those evil spirits speak out of her. Could we not have remained upon the high road? But no, immediately upon leaving Villach, we must go on sumpter horses and mules over the worst roads and most frightful precipices. And wherefore? Because she so willed it. Had we remained on the great road, Mr. Muller (God be merciful to him!) would still to-day have drunk his glass of wine."

ATTEMPT FOR AN ENGAGEMENT.

The return of the people of the house, with my spare evening's meal, interrupted Sebald's gossip. He pro mised when we were again alone to disclose many more secrets. He left me. In his place, a small, thin, gloomy looking man seated himself, whom Sebald, on