ALEXANDER THE GREAT. ALEXANDER, the son of Philip, succeeded at the age of twenty to the throne of Macedon, about 336 years before the Christian era. On the night of his birth, the great temple of Diana, at Eph'esus, one of the most wonderful edifices ever erected by human skill, was burnt to the ground by He-ros'trătus, who madly hoped to perpetuate his memory by the incendiary deed. The first warlike expedition of Alexander was against the barbarians to the north of his kingdom. During his engagements. here a powerful confederacy was formed against him by the Grecian states; and the Thebans, upon a false report of his death, killed all the Macedonians within the reach of their fury. Alexander speedily came against their city, took it, and utterly destroyed it: six thousand of the inhabitants were slain, and thirty thousand were sold for slaves. This dreadful example of severity spread the terror of his arms through all Greece, and those who had been opposed to him were compelled to submit. A general assembly of the states of Greece was now summoned at Corinth. Alexander, as heir of his father, was made generalissimo against the Persians, and he immediately commenced preparations for the momentous expedition. Alexander set off with an army of only thirty thousand foot and five thousand horse, and provisions for a single month. He crossed the Hellespont, and marched through Asia Minor, toward Persia. Dari'us resolved to crush at once this inconsiderate youth, and met him on the banks of the Gran'icus, with a hundred thousand foot and ten thousand horse. The Greeks swam the river, their king leading the van, and, attacking the astonished Persians, left twenty thousand dead upon the field, and put to flight their whole army. Darius was left almost alone in his lofty chariot; he had but just time to get on horseback and gallop away from the battle. Alexander now sent home his fleet, leaving to his army the sole alternative that they must subdue Asia or perish. Prosecuting their course for some time without resistance, the Greeks were attacked by the Persians in a narrow valley of Cilicia, near the town of Issus. The Persian host amounted to four hundred thousand, but their situation was such that only a small part could come into action, and they were defeated with prodigious slaughter. The loss of the Persians was a hundred and ten thousand; that of the Greeks, very inconsiderable. After the battle of Issus, Alexander besieged Tyre; but the Tyrians resisted him, with great bravery, for seven months. At length the city was taken by storm, and thirty thousand of its population were sold for slaves, and two thousand were crucified upon the sea-shore, for no other crime than that of defending the country from an invader. The shocking cruelty of Alexander to this city stamps him with | amazing treasures. Excited by intemper eternal infamy. Incensed with the Jews for not sending supplies to his army when besieging Tyre, Alexander marched to Jerusalem, resolved upon its ruin. Jaddus, the high priest, and all the other priests of the temple, proceeded from the city to meet him, and to implore his mercy. Alexander no sooner saw the venerable procession than he paid the high priest all the tokens of profound respect, and left them in satisfaction and peace, without in the least molesting the temple or the city. The whole of Syria had submitted to Alexander; Gaza had followed the fate of Tyre; ten thousand of its inhabitants were sold into slavery, and its brave defender, Belis, was dragged at the wheels of his victor's chariot — an act far more disgraceful to the conqueror than to the conquered. The taking of Gaza opened Egypt to Alexander, and the whole country submitted without opposition. Amidst the most incredible fatigues, he led his army through the deserts of Lybia, to visit the temple of his pretended father, Jupiter of Ammon. When intoxicated with the pride of success, he listened to the base flattery of the priests; and, upon the foolish presumption of his being the son of that Lybian god, he received adoration from his followers. Returning from Egypt, Alexander traversed Assyria, and was met at Arbela by Darius, at the head of seven hundred thousand men. Peace, on very advantageous terms, was offered by the Persians, but was haughtily rejected. The Persians were defeated at Arbela, with the loss of three hundred thousand men, and Darius fled from province to province. At length, betrayed by Bessus, one of his own satraps, he was cruelly murdered, and the Persian empire submitted to the conqueror, 330 B. C. After the battle of Arbēla, Alexander marched in triumph to the cities of Babylon, Susa, and Persep'olis, where he found ance, and instigated by a wicked woman, he set fire to the magnificent palaces of the Persian kings, that no one should enjoy them but himself. Alexander, firmly persuaded that the sovereignty of the whole habitable globe had been decreed him, now projected the conquest of India. He penetrated to the Ganges, defeated Porus, and would have proceeded to the Indian Ocean, if the spirit of his army had kept pace with his ambition; but his troops, seeing no end to their toils, refused to proceed. Indignant that he had found an end to his conquests, he abandoned himself to every excess of luxury and debauchery. Returning again to Babylon, laden with the riches and plunder of the East, he entered that celebrated city in the greatest pomp and magnificence. His return to it, however, was foretold by his magicians as fatal, and their prediction was fulfilled. Giving himself up still further to intoxication and vice of every kind, he at last, after a fit of drunkenness, was seized with a fever, which at intervals deprived him of his reason, and after a few days put a period to his existence; and he died at Babylon, on the 21st of April, in the thirty-second year of his age, after a reign of twelve years and eight months of the most brilliant success. His death was so sudden and premature, that many attributed it to poison. There was once a certain pirate who made great havoc among the shipping of the Mediterranean Sea. He was taken prisoner by the Macedonian soldiers, and brought before Alexander, who asked him by what right he committed his robberies. BUNCOMBE. THE FOURTH OF JULY, 1776. From the Speech of Edward Everett, at the banquet of the Democratic Club, in Boston, July 5th, 1858. SIR, I have lately seen much of this noble country, and I have learned, as I have seen it more, to love it better. The 227 when Jefferson and Adams joined hands to draft the great Declaration, - - if I could live to see that happy day, I would, upon my honor, sir, go to my grave as cheerfully as the tired and contented laborer goes to his nightly rest. I shall, in the course of nature, go to it before long, at any rate; and I wish no other epitaph to be placed upon it than this: "Through evil report and through good report, he loved his country." enterprising, ingenious, and indomitable For myself, I have found in every part of the country generous traits of character, vast and well-understood capacities of prog'ress, and hopeful auguries of good; and, taken in the aggregate, they are the abode of a population as intelligent, as prosperous, as moral and religious, as any to be found on the surface of the globe. : There is, however, one little corner of each which I should like to annihilate; if I could wield a magician's wand, I would sink it to the center. Its name is Buncombe not the respectable county of that name in North Carolina, against which I have nothing to say, but a pestilent little political electioneering Buncombe, in every state, and every district, which is the prolific source of most of our troubles. If we could get rid, sir, of Buncombe, and if we could bring back the harmony which reigned on the day which we celebrate, and the days which preceded and followed it, when Massachusetts summoned Washington to lead the armies of New England; when Virginia and Carolina sent their supplies of corn and of rice to feed their famished brethren in Boston; THE FOURTH OF JULY, 1776. From the same Speech. I KNOW, sir, that "Union-saving," as it is derisively called, is treated in some quarters with real or affected contempt. I am content to share in the ridicule which attaches to an anxiety for the preservation of the Union, which prompted one sixth part of Washington's farewell address. Would to Heaven that his sadly earnest counsels on this subject might spread peace and brotherly love throughout the land, as if the sainted hero himself could burst his cerements, and proclaim them in visible presence before his fellow-citizens! They would be worth to us, merely in reference to national strength, more than armies or navies, or "walls along the steep." I speak literally, sir: it were better for the safety of the country against a foreign foe that the Union of the States should be preserved, than that we should wield the army of Napoleon and the navy of England, while hovering on the verge of separation. It would be less dangerous that the combined fleets of Europe should thunder in our seaports, than that one half of the country should be arrayed against the other. I must not, however, forget, sir, that you bid me speak of "the day we celebrate." But how can I do so in worthy terms, unless, indeed, I could borrow the breathing thoughts, the burning words, to which we have already listened with delight! Surely a day without a parallel in the history of nations! For where, in the annals of mankind, in ancient or modern times, can we find a day like that, on which, after centuries of conscious and unconscious preparation, upon the illustrious theater of a vast continent, hidden for thousands of years from the rest of mankind, a group of feeble colonial dependencies, by one authentic and solemn act, proclaimed themselves to the world an independent confederacy of Sovereign States! I repeat, sir, that on the Fourth of July, eighty-two years ago, a deed which not France, nor England, nor Rome, nor Greece, can match in all their annals, was done at Philadelphia, in Independence Let Philadelphia guard that hall as the apple of her eye. Let time respect and violence spare it. Let every stone, and every brick, and every plank, and every bolt, from the foundation to the pinnacle, be sacred. Let the rains of heaven fall softly on the roof, and the winds of winter beat gently at the door. Let it stand to the end of time, second only to Mount Vernon, as the sanctuary of American patriotism. Let generation on generation of those who taste the blessings of that great declaration pay their homage at the shrine, and deem it no irreverence, as they kneel in gratitude to the Providence which guided and inspired the men who assembled therein, to call its walls salvation, and its gates praise! AN APT COMPLIMENT. I heard the late Mr. Samuel Rogers, the venerable banker-poet, of London, more than once relate that he was present, on the 10th of December, 1790, when Sir Joshua Reynolds delivered the last of his discourses before the Royal Academy of Art. Edmund Burke was also one of the audience; and at the close of the lecture Mr. Rogers saw him go up to Sir Joshua, and heard him say, in the fullness of his delight, in the words of Milton, "The angel ended, and in Adam's ear Thought him still speaking, still stood fixed to hear." When our friend (Rufus Choate) con cluded his superb oration, this morning, I was ready, like Mr. Cruger, of York (who stood with Burke for the representation of Bristol), "to say ditto to Mr. Burke." I was unwilling to believe that the noble strain, by turns persuasive, melting, and sublime, had ended. - Edward Everett, July 5th, 1858. THE SPIDER. ERNEST had accompanied his father into the vineyards, which were rich with promise for the coming autumn. There he found a honey-bee struggling in the web of a large garden spider, which had already opened its fangs to seize upon its prey; but Ernest set the bee at liberty, and destroyed the glistening snare. The father, observing what had passed, inquired of his son how he could so lightly esteem the skill and ingenuity of the little artist as to annihilate its work in a moment. "Didst thou not see with what beauty and order those slender threads were inter woven? How couldst thou, then, be at the same moment so pitiful, and yet so hardhearted?" Is there not evil in the spider's art? But the boy excused himself, saying, for it only tends to destruction, whereas the bee gathers honey and wax within its cell. So I gave freedom to the bee, and destroyed the spider's web." The father was pleased at this decision of a simple child, who saw no beauty in ingenuity when its aim was destruction. "But," continued the father, "perhaps thou hast been unjust toward the spider. See how it protects our ripening grapes from the flies and wasps, by means of the net which it weaves around the branches." "Does it do so," asked the boy, "with the intention of protecting our grapes, or merely that it may satisfy its own thirst for blood?" "Truly," replied his father, "it troubles itself very little about our grapes." 66 O," said Ernest, "then the good it does can not be worth much; for I have SUCCESS OF OUR REPUBLIC. 229 heard you say that it is a good will alone | the hour of need. To say nothing of our which can impart beauty or goodness even having encountered, with glory unsurpassed, to the most useful actions." all the chances of a foreign war on the plains of Mexico, we have twice challenged to arms that proud England whose child 66 Very true, my boy. We may be thankful, however, that in the course of nature that which is evil often fosters what is good and useful, without intending to do so." Wherefore," inquired Ernest, "does the spider sit so solitary in his web, whilst the bees live sociably together, and work in union? Why might not the spiders also make one huge web, and use it in common?" "Dear child," answered his father, "a good object alone can insure friendly cooperation. The bond of wickedness or selfishness contains within itself the seeds of dissolution. Therefore, wise Nature never attempts that which men too often learn by their own experience to be vain and impracticable." SUCCESS OF OUR REPUBLIC. From the Oration of Caleb Cushing in New York, July 5th, 1858. I AVER that the present condition, not less than the history of the Union, serves to prove its preeminent success beyond all other existing governments of Christendom. Let us see. I will compare the United States, not with the other republics of America, but with the great states of Europe. They say we possess no adequate military organization. It is true we do not support immense standing armies; but, for that very cause, we retain the larger reserved capacity of military execution in we are. Alexander would take part in the Olympic games, if he might obtain kings for competitors. We certainly have had European antagonists worthy of the Republic. In the first war with England we achieved our independence on the land; in the second, our independence on the sea. We plucked from the banners of invading armies the laurels accumulated on them by a hundred victories; we conquered the conquerors of Europe and Asia — for to us alone have British armies surrendered; and the triumphs of Saratoga, of Yorktown, and of the Thames, bear witness that the blood of our fathers of England, Scotland, and Ireland, runs red in the veins of their descendants in America. True it is, I know, that our country is not bristled over with the bayonets of standing armies, nor our land covered with citadels, like France, Austria, Prussia, Russia; but let no vain thought of our being weak in a military respect enter the imaginations of foreign enemies, if such we have, or shall have, in Europe or America. No, for every freeman of the United States is a soldier, every city is a citadel of brave men, every rural home is a fortress, or the unit of an army ready to be combined in a moment for the defense of the Union. Our militia is the inexhaustible resource of military strength. Have not we of this generation seen it in the fields of Queenstown and of New Orleans? Have we not seen it on the plains and in the mountain passes of Mexico? But we are told that popular commotion, or other abuses of public or of individual freedom, disturb our great cities, and sometimes threaten the public peace in our frontier settlements. Civic disturbances - frontier commotion-forsooth! What is all that, compared with the desolating wars, the |