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way, and the loggers' train penetrates to Chesuncook Lake, and still higher up, even two hundred miles above Bangor. Imagine the solitary sledtrack running far up into the snowy and evergreen wilderness, hemmed in closely for a hundred miles by the forest, and again stretching straight across the broad surfaces of concealed lakes!

We were soon in the smooth water of the Quakish Lake, and took our turus at rowing and paddling across it. It is a small, irregular, but haudsome lake, shut in on all sides by the forest, and showing no traces of man but some low boom in a distant cove, reserved for Spring use.

The spruce

and cedar on its shores, hung with gray moss, looked at a distance like the ghosts of trees. Ducks were sailing here and there on its surface, and a solitary loon, like a more living wave—a vital spot on the lake's surface-laughed and frolicked, and showed its straight leg, for our amusement. Joe Merry Mountain appeared in the northwest, as if it were looking down on this lake especially; and we had our first, but a partial view of Ktaadn, its summit veiled in clouds, like a dark isthmus in that quarter, connecting the heavens with the earth. After two miles of smooth rowing across this lake, we found ourselves in the river again, which was a continuous rapid for one mile, to the dam, requiring all the strength and skill of our boatmen to pole up it.

This dam is a quite important and expensive work for this country, whither cattle and horses cannot penetrate in the Summer, raising the whole river ten feet, and flooding, as they said, some sixty square miles by means of the innumerable lakes with which the river connects. It is a lofty and solid structure, with sloping piers some distance above, made of frames of logs filled with stones, to break the ice. Here every log pays toll as it passes through the sluices.

We filed into the rude logger's camp at this place, such as I have described, without ceremony, and the cook, at that moment the sole occupant, at once set about preparing tea for his visitors. His fire-place, which the rain had converted into a mud-puddle, was soon blazing again, and we sat down on the log benches around it to dry us.

On the well-flattened, and somewhat faded beds of arbor-vitæ leaves, which stretched on either hand under the eaves behind us, lay an odd leaf of the Bible, some genealogical chapter out of the Old Testament; and, half buried by the leaves, we found Emerson's Address on West India Emancipation, which had been left here formerly by one of our company; and had had two converts to the liberty party here, as I was told; also, an odd number of the Westminster Review, for 1834, and a pamphlet entitled History of the Erection of the Monument on the Grave of Myron Holly. This was the readable, or reading matter, in a lumberer's camp in the Maine woods, thirty miles from a road, which would be given up to the bears in a fortnight. These things were well thumbed and soiled. This gang was headed by one John Morrison, a good specimen of a Yankee; and was necessarily composed of men not bred to the business of dam-building, but who were Jacksat-all-trades, handy with the axe, and other simple implements, and well skilled in wood and water craft. We had hot cakes for our supper, even here white as snow-balls, but without butter, and the never-failing sweet cakes, with which we filled our pockets, foreseeing that we should not soon meet with the like again. Such delicate puffballs seemed a singular diet for backwoodsmen. There was also tea without milk, sweetened with molasses. And so, exchanging a word with John Morrison and his gang when we had returned to the shore, and also exchanging our batteau for a better still, we made haste to improve the little daylight that remained. This camp, exactly twenty-nine miles from Mattawamkeag Point, by the way we had come, and about one hundred from Bangor by the river, was the last human habitation of any kind in this direction. Beyond, there was no trail; and the river and lakes, by batteau and canoes, was considered the only practicable route. We were about thirty miles by the river from the summit of Ktaadn, which was in sight, though not more than twenty, perhaps, in a straight line.

[END OF PART II]

BY GEO.

STARS come not down from their eternal blue
To pierce the clouds that spurn their beauty back;
And when the blast divides the sullen black,
Their radiant love-light glides revengeless through,
As if no scorning fog had mocked their view.
Wheeling forever in its golden track,

The great sun wars not on the tempest's rack,

But gilds alike, rough storm and quiet dew.

Such regal greatness beams from giant souls,
Such starry love shines down from sky-broad hearts;
Bound in high order to their infinite goals

On all below their free-flung splendor darts,
And no cloud-frown. or claim of huge desire
Shall mar or grasp one beam of their immortal fire.

GOD grasps at random the men whom he has destined to represent their generation on earth,-he imparts and assigns them the physical organs of life, to fill the vacant department of thought, and to inspire all who need the guiding light of their intellect, with a precious immortality of celestial hopes.

The subject of this brief sketch, was the Imperio Natos of his time; and so gracefully did the duty of empire rest upon him, that its requisitions were little less burdensome than the simple joys which cluster around the happy sphere of domestic life. The scholar, sage, poet and statesman, were in him so immediately mingled, that he might have stood forth as the multiplied embodiment of all.

It is only as a dweller in the fruitful realm of thought, that we should consider the subject of this insufficient sketch. We would not stir the hallowed dust of recent memories, to revive a single public act; inasmuch as all of those actions are destined to live beyond him or the age in which he existed. They have become distinct and settled matters of history, and will go down the pathway of years, burdened with the spirit of their originator.

A toil-worn but devoted heart, offering up the better moments of existence upon the altar of Eternity, those thoughts which are to pass into other ages and distant lands, to live in others' emotions when he that conceived them has mouldered into dust, is a matter of ineffable interest to us all. It is this which hallows the writer's calling; and inasmuch as those thoughts are unconnected with the outward affairs of the world, in an inverse ratio do they abstract the utterer from actual and ordinary existence.

"His soul is like a star, and dwells apart."

It is this air of the spiritual that hovers around the scholar, which gives his life and actions a peculiar moral influence. We love to revel in the enchantments which his imagination hath created around us, and to watch and emulate the slow degrees by which he was lifted into life. While we thus contemplate the strong soul seated in the serenity of sceptred strength, we are prompted to inquire where lay the charm of power, and how it is that men are so willing to dwell in the majesty of mental contentment when acquiring the set of principles which he has laid down for

them to recognise. Like the azure depths of the great heavens, does the wealth of such a soul expand itself, touching, like the circling currents of the viewless air, every object in the widest bounds of nature. The feelings of such a man do not weaken by diffusion, but spring up in fragrance and beautify the pathway to the grave.

The poetry of a life like this, if, as the poet hath said it, "were all poetry," instead of being engrossed with the cares of state, would be stamped with the seal of something more than human. But Mr. Adams' verse was only the reflex of individual emotion, and not the precious offspring of spiritual experience. Amidst the pressure of political cares, it was the smooth stream gliding through a forest-bright amid the darkness-that bears the soul gently from horrid tangles into quiet meadows and smooth fields of joy.

There is a charm in the display of such power, which enthrals the soul: we do not look for the whirlwind of emotions which rend in twain every passion in Byron, or the calm serenity of Wordsworth, or the lurid and splendid visions of Dante. He indulges in no straining after the impossible-in no reaching after the unattainable-but in settled peace he looks upon things with the calm eye of philosophic experience. This is somewhat peculiar in one to whom poetry is not an art. He could lend the listening sense to every grateful sound of earth and air, and infuse his own spirit in them all. This homogeneousness of mind pointedly illustrates its versatility, for in proportion to the largeness of the intellect is the variety of sympathy. There was no mental intolerance in anything Mr. A. did; he had lived long enough to emerge from the thraldom of his emotions-his thoughts flow along weltering on the waves of time, an argosy of exhaustless wealth. Poetry derives its chief charm from association. With the music of his name who

"Woke to ecstasy the living lyre," vibrate in our memory his actions, looks and character. It is with such feelings that we listen to the drifts of thought, melody and feeling that flowed from Mr. Adams's pen. Some image of peace and joy they constantly revive: the bird, the picture, the flower, that nameless something which serves as a universal bond of reverence between the common brotherhood of man.

The youth gradually forsakes his romantic fancies as he emerges into manhood, naturally obliterating in the actual world of things all perception of the beautiful; but how rare it is to find one whose head is white with the drifting snow of cares, still lingering in the temple of the ideal! What a contrast is presented in the character of the venerable man, whose life of light has just gone out in the darkness of the grave! Absorbed in the cares of state-standing at the head of historyserving the nation in distant lands-he was all the same

44 Sage in meditation found."

A tone of generous and enlightened feeling pervades all Mr. Adams's published writings; the warm friend of every scheme of philanthropy and improvement, they appeal to every principle of imperishable truth and affection, that is laid in the foundation of our life. But what a touching and memorable life and death! In the nation's capi tol, where his voice had oft been lifted in solemn warning to his countrymen, his eagle spirit took its glorious flight. Brightly it passed from the strife of the world

"In the long way that each must tread alone." The messenger came without warning, amidst engrossing duties; and at an hour when we needed his counsels most, the cold hand of death was laid upon his heart, and it was pulseless forever.

There is something fine enough for a grouping in the scene between the dying statesman and Mr. Clay. Seuse had fled, and the only visible token of life remaining was the wild wave heaving to and fro in his bosom. There stood the old man of Ashland speechless with emotion, while the tears rolled over his furrowed checks, the unmistakable {sign of heartfelt grief. This was a heavy blow,

but

"Life to everything that breathes is full of care." Two great spirits, who had stood side by side, champions of liberty and the cause of humanity, had met for the last time on earth. Struggle and strife, the common doom of man, they had both shared-both had displayed the same wide range of thought; the same vivid abundance of suggestion in supplying the wants of a people grown up beneath their fostering care. As if no change could be, in the clear lustre of their exhaustless souls, men began to think the monarch mind could never wander from its seat. But

The dead are everywhere,

Where'er is love, or tenderness, or faith;

Where'er is pomp or pleasure, pride; where'er
Life is or was, is death.

It is the province of men of genius to adorn each other's life-they "multiply themselves in others;" but to themselves alone the beauty of their minds is revealed with a clearer and purer light. Each in his own high contemplation sits apart, and every radi

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ant hue in the realm of fancy is reflected back and forth, and spreads around a glow of delightan inspiration of eternity.

To quicken the influence of this perception, we have ventured to include a little lyric, the produc| tion of Caleb Lyon, the poet and oriental scholar; and as the germ of a poet's sympathy is in his heart, it presents a touching tribute to the power of the affections and their duties, in coloring with a changeless joy the deep and mighty spirit, whose starlight of antique knowledge shed around the glory and freshness of a dream," and was enshrined with every function and attribute of the Deity.

66

JOHN QUINCY ADAMS.

LINES WRITTEN IN THE CAPITOL, THE EVENING OF FEBRUARY

23, 1848.

BY CALEB LYON, OF LYONSDALE.

Tis night, and the stars are their lone vigils keeping,
And shed their bright rays o'er the Capitol's dome;
Tis night, and the dews of evening are weeping,
For angels are bearing a weary heart home.
War-worn, he fell on the field where he battled-
The champion of freedom, the veteran of years:
Where the conflicts of mind fiercely echoing rattled,

Nor dimmed were his triumphs with suffering or tears. Though his body may perish, his mind in its splendor Shall beacon us onward, a star in the sky;

And filling our spirits with mem'ries most tender,
We'll mourn that the good and pure-hearted must die.
No more shall his voice, with eloquence burning,
Plead earnest for truth, when dark errors enslave;
A heart full of kindness-a mind gemmed with learning-
"The path of whose glory but lead to the grave."

He has gone where a Congress of Nations are meeting,

Whose names are impressed on the deeds of an age; He has gone where the Pilgrims of Freedom are greeting The scholar, the statesman, the patriot, the sage. Such is the power of the song of the minstrel, and let no man reject it, for the poet is the unacknowledged legislator of men. "Let me write the songs of a nation, and I do not care who makes its laws," says Swift. The observation is profoundly true: a single line from Horace will urge millions to die for their country; and another of Virgil will bring a tear to the eye of the far-wandering patriot, and teach him, even in death, to think of his own lovely land.

Mr. Adams's lyre was strung with no such chords, neither did it tremble with any such fire of inspiration. His lines are impressive from their composure-there is a sensation of humor too, refined from all grossness;-they are thrown off with an easy and familiar effect, which leaves us to believe that the mine of poetic richness was not properly worked. It is a voice of healthful freshness, inviting us to partake of the feast of life. It reflects its own state. There is no desponding prospect, no regretful retrospect, the signs of a laden and troubled heart.

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