examination of the neighborhood by peering over the barrier, he might satisfy himself whether the enemy was still on the island. He concluded moreover, that no one,—not even a Florida indian,—would imagine that a human being could remain suspended in mid-air on the top of that tower and alive, at least, forty-eight hours after such an explosion as must have occurred at its base. Nevertheless, he remained perfectly still for some time hearkening anxiously to every sound from land and sea. Nothing was borne to him that gave the slightest indication of a savage. At length he ventured to lift up his head and look towards the dwelling. A glance assured him that it was deserted, for it had been burnt since the catastrophe, and the whole of its blackened exterior was visible from his elevation. He searched the surrounding sands which had been beaten by the recent rains, but he could not detect the track of a human foot. As he cast his eyes towards the strait, in the direction of the main, he descried a canoe containing at least three persons crawling slowly from under the lee of the island, and passing towards Florida. It bore unquestionably,

the remnant of his red-skinned tormentors!

Nor was his seaward view less cheering. A couple of miles from the landing, within full sight, so that he could distinctly discern the people walking her deck, a trim little schooner, under full sail, was steering southward!

It was the work of a moment to bind together, with his braces, a couple of ramrods from the muskets that still rested on the ledge, and to attach to them the shirt of which he stripped himself.

He was seen! Sail was shortened on the schooner, till under easy canvass, she approached the land as near as practicable; when backing her mainsail, she "laid to," and sent her boat ashore.

The excitement of hope and present rescue quickly aroused the torpid blood and benumbed limbs of the Mitchell did not start weather-beaten prisoner.

Yet

from his ledge till he saw the

skiff dash through the

Then with a vigor that

breakers and come within hail. nothing but the joy of escape could have imparted, he sprang to the lightning rod that still clung to the wall, and gliding down it to the ground, ran to the beach and fell swooning in the bottom of the savior boat.

THE MISSISSIPPI.

MONARCH of rivers in the wide domain
Where Freedom writes her signature in stars,
And bids her eagle bear the cheering scroll
To usher in the reign of peace and love,
Thou mighty Mississippi!-may my song
Swell with thy power, and though an humble rill,
Roll, like thy current, through the sea of time;
Bearing thy name, as tribute from soul
Of fervent gratitude and holy praise,
To Him who poured thy multitude of waves.

my

Shadowed beneath those awful piles of stone,
Where Liberty has found a Pisgah height,
O'erlooking all the land she loves to bless,-
The jagged rocks and icy towers her guard,
Whose splintered summits seize the warring clouds,
And roll them, broken, like a host o'erthrown,
Adown the mountains' side, scattering their wealth
Of powdered pearl and liquid diamond-drops,-
There is thy source,—great River of the West!

Slowly, like youthful Titan gathering strength
To war with heaven and win himself a name,
The stream moves onward through the dark ravines,
Rending the roots of overarching trees

To form its narrow channel, where the star
That fain would bathe its beauty in the wave,

With lover's glance steals, trembling, through the leaves

That veil the waters with a vestal's care:

And few of human form have ventured there

Save the swart savage in his bark canoe.

But now it deepens, rushes, struggles on;
Like goaded warhorse, bounding o'er the foe,
It clears the rocks it may not spurn aside,
Leaping, as Curtius leaped, adown the gulf,-
And rising, like Antæus, from the fall,
Its course majestic through the land pursues,
And the broad river o'er the valley reigns!

It reigns alone. The tributary streams
Are humble vassals, yielding to the sway;
And when the wild Missouri fain would join
A rival in the race-as Jacob seized
On his red brother's birthright, even so
The swelling Mississippi grasps that wave,
And, re-baptizing, makes the waters one.

It reigns alone and earth the sceptre feels:

Her ancient trees are bowed beneath the wave,
Or, rent like reeds before the whirlwind's swoop,

Toss on the bosom of the maddened flood

A floating forest, till the waters, calmed,
Like slumbering anaconda gorged with prey,
Open a haven to the moving mass

Or form an island in the vast abyss.

It reigns alone. Old Nile would ne'er bedew
The lands it blesses with its fertile tide.

Even sacred Ganges joined with Egypt's flood
Would shrink beside this wonder of the West!
Ay, gather Europe's royal rivers all—
The snow-swelled Neva, with an Empire's weight
On her broad breast, she yet may overwhelm;
Dark Danube, hurrying, as by foe pursued
Through shaggy forests and by palace walls
To hide its terrors in a sea of gloom;

The castled Rhine, whose vine-crowned waters flow

The fount of fable and the source of song;
The rushing Rhine, in whose cerulean depths
The loving sky seems wedded with the wave;
The yellow Tiber, choked with Roman spoils,
A dying miser shrinking 'neath his gold;
And Seine, where fashion glasses fairest forms;