integrity, the men of the loyal States forgot the lines that separated them in name. California and Minnesota, Maryland and New Hampshire followed the same flag into the battle, side by side, and shoulder to shoulder. And the men of Massachusetts and Illinois answered to the same watchword and countersign to the soldier from Ohio, as he stood sentry on the banks of the Mississippi, or among the wild fastnesses of Eastern Tennessee. It has been a nation's war, for a nation's glory, a nation's integrity, and a nation's independence. Europe has at last begun to measure with something of adequate estimate, the value of a nationality on this side the water, which, in her eagerness to see broken and dissevered, she had begun to despise, and looked forward to trample upon with impunity.

It is the great lesson of the day. Come what will, it should never be forgotten, that our country, united, nationalized, animated by a common will for a common cause, will stand as peerless in power as she has been prosperous and free.

The brain of the people should be taught, the heart of the people should be made to feel that the honor of the nation is in the charge of every freeman in the land. Let this lesson once be impressed upon the people of this country, and the world would learn to acknowledge that wherever her Starry Flag was floating, its folds sheltered

whoever had a right to its protection. And that whenever her voice was heard, it was the language of a nation that was willing to be just and magnanimous, while it knew how to maintain its honor, and enforce its rights.

A VOICE.

A VOICE comes wailing o'er the wave,
From the dear land afar;

Alas! my country, that such wails
Should reach us here so far;

A trumpet note, a dread appeal,
That shakes the throbbing world

Until the pulse of human hearts

Stands still, the banners furled!

There was a vase, a golden vase,

Hid in that forest green,

Held by a chain, but cloud-wrought links,

Now melted into rain;

The rain of human tears that fall,

Because that vase is broken,

In fragments lie the shattered bits

Mournful and sad a token.

A token of a Nation great,
Of a great Nation's call,

O God! we cry to Thee too late,
But deign to hear our call.

Alas! the voice is wailing sad,
O'er these blue fields of air;
Echoed in billows from the sea;
From the dear land afar.
Alas! my country, broken links
In that bright chain are riven;
We need the smile of God to cheer

From these blue rents of Heaven.

WRITTEN AT ROME, 1862.

BALTIMORE LONG AGO.

LIFE has a double expanse; one in the past, the other in the future: the present is but a dividing line-an isthmus, rather, between two oceans. Our retrospects widen every day; our prospects grow narrow.

I have come to that stage at which I live in the one as much as in the other;-puzzled to say whether I belong most to the antiques or the moderns. Why not confess it? To come smoothly and cheerfully up to the "great climacteric," is, of itself a glory,-being an honest victory over time, and always a good token of a tranquil future.

The past presents a mellow landscape to my vision, rich with the hues of distance, and softened by a sunny haze, that still retains that tint of the rose-now sobered a little into the neutral-with which youth and hope once set it aglow. The present is a foreground less inviting, with a growing predominance of sharp lines and garish colors wanting harmony. So, I follow the bent of my humor and, for a while, renounce the present, to indulge