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And this deep mountain valley was to him
Soundless, with all its streams. The bird of dawn
Did never rouse this cottager from sleep
With startling summons; not for his delight
The vernal cuckoo shouted; not for him
Murmured the laboring bee. When stormy winds
Were working the broad bosom of the lake
Into a thousand sparkling waves,

Rocking the trees, or driving cloud on cloud
Along the sharp edge of yon lofty crags,
The agitated scene before his eye
Was silent as a picture: evermore

Were all things silent wheresoe'er he moved.
Yet, by the solace of his own pure thoughts
Upheld, he duteously pursued the round
Of rural labors; the steep mountain side
Ascended with his staff and faithful dog;
The plough he guided, and the scythe he swayed;
And the ripe corn before his sickle fell
Among the jocund reapers. For himself,
All watchful and industrious as he was,

He wrought not; neither field nor flock he owned:
No wish for wealth had place within his mind;
Nor husband's love, nor father's hope or care.
Though born a younger brother, need was none
That from the floor of his paternal home
He should depart, to plant himself anew.
And when, mature in manhood, he beheld
His parents laid in earth, no loss ensued

Of rights to him; but he remained, well pleased,
By the pure bond of independent love,
An inmate of a second family,

The fellow-laborer and friend of him

To whom the small inheritance had fallen.

Nor deem that his mild presence was a weight That pressed upon his brother's house, for books Were ready comrades, whom he could not tire,

Of whose society the blameless man
Was never satiate. Their familiar voice,
Even to old age, with unabated charm,

Beguiled his leisure hours; refreshed his thoughts;
Beyond its natural elevation raised

His introverted spirit; and bestowed
Upon his life an outward dignity

Which all acknowledged. The dark winter night,
The stormy day, had each its own resource;―
Song of the muses, sage historic tale,
Science severe, or word of holy writ,
Announcing immortality and joy
To the assembled spirits of the just,
From imperfection and decay secure.

At length, when sixty years and five were told,

A slow disease insensibly consumed

The powers of nature; and a few short steps

Of friends and kindred bore him from his home
To the profounder stillness of the grave.
Nor was his funeral denied the grace

Of many tears, virtuous and thoughtful grief;
Heart-sorrow rendered sweet by gratitude.

LESSON LV.

Forest Trees preparing for Winter.-N. A. REVIEW.

It is interesting to observe the manner in which trees, as the year declines, prepare themselves to resist the cold, and to battle with the winter storms. They seem like vessels closing their ports, tightening their cordage, and taking in their sails, when only the veteran seaman would know that a tempest is on the way. They drop their leaves, bind close their trunks, and suspend their vital movements,

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as soon as they hear the first whispers of the gale. The substance of the tree retains an even temperature throughout the year: it draws the sap from a depth where it is colder in summer and warmer in winter than the external soil. The bark, too, a slow conductor of heat, serves to retain its warmth; and the tree seems to make this preparation, as if it knew that, should the cold penetrate and burst its vessels, it will surely die. It gets rid of its superfluous moisture as soon as possible, the danger of frost being increased in proportion to the water which it contains; for, as our cultivators know from the sad experience of the winter of 1831-2, a sudden cold after a wet season is very apt to be fatal; but, except in extraordinary times, they contrive to secure themselves so effectually, that the severest winter cannot destroy them. Meantime the fallen leaves, unlike all other vegetable decay, seem to aid in purifying the air. Any one, who has walked through a forest after the fall of the leaf, must have observed the sharp, peculiar smell of its decay. In short, every thing about these lords of the wood is striking to a thoughtful mind. Their graceful and majestic forms are pleasing to the eye; their construction and internal action excite the curiosity, and worthily employ the mind; they breathe health and fragrance upon the air, and in many, probably many yet undiscovered ways, declare themselves the friends of man.

LESSON LVI.

Falls of Niagara.-U. S. L. GAZETTE.

WE passed about fifty rods under the Table rock, beneath whose brow and crumbling sides we could not stop to shudder, our minds were at once so excited and oppressed, as we approached that eternal gateway, which Nature has built of the motionless rocks and the rushing

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torrent, as a fitting entrance to her most awful magnificence. We turned a jutting corner of the rock, and the chasm yawned upon us. The noise of the cataract was most deafening; its headlong grandeur rolled from the very skies; we were drenched by the overflowings of the stream; our breath was checked by the violence of the wind, which, for a moment, scattered away the clouds of mist, when a full view of the torrent, raining down its diamonds in infinite profusion, opened upon us. Nothing could equal the flashing brilliancy of the spectacle; the weight of the falling waters made the very rock beneath us tremble, and from the cavern that received them issued a roar, as if the confined spirits of all who had ever been drowned, joined in a united scream for help! Here we stood, in the very jaws of Niagara,-deafened by an uproar, whose tremendous din seemed to fall upon the ear in tangible and ceaseless strokes, and surrounded by an unimaginable and oppressive grandeur. My mind recoiled from the immensity of the tumbling tide, and thought of time and eternity, and felt that nothing but its immortality could rise against the force of such an element.

LESSON LVII.

Lines written in a blank Leaf of La Perouse's Voyages.CAMPBELL.

LOVED Voyager! whose pages had a zest
More sweet than fiction to my wondering breast,
When, rapt in fancy, many a boyish day,

I tracked his wanderings o'er the watery way,
Roamed round the Aleutian isles in waking dreams,
Or plucked the fleur-de-lys by Jesso's streams-

* Flower of the lily.

Or gladly leaped on that far Tartar strand,

Where Europe's anchor ne'er had bit the sand,
Where scarce a roving wild tribe crossed the plain,
Or human voice broke nature's silent reign;
But vast and grassy deserts feed the bear,

And sweeping deer-herds dread no hunter's snare.
Such young delight his real records brought,
His truth so touched romantic springs of thought,
That, all my after-life, his fate and fame,
Entwined romance with La Perouse's name.

Fair were his ships, expert his gallant crews,
And glorious was th' emprise of La Perouse,
Humanely glorious! Men will weep for him,
When many a guilty martial fame is dim.

He ploughed the deep to bind no captive's chain-
Pursued no rapine-strowed no wreck with slain;
And, save that in the deep themselves lie low,
His heroes plucked no wreath from human wo.
"Twas his the earth's remotest bounds to scan,
Conciliating with gifts barbaric man—
Enrich the world's contemporaneous mind,
And amplify the picture of mankind.
Far on the vast Pacific,-'midst those isles
O'er which the earliest morn of Asia smiles,-
He sounded and gave charts to many a shore
And gulf of ocean new to nautic lore;
Yet he that led discovery o'er the wave,
Still fills himself an undiscovered grave.

He came not back; conjecture's cheek grew pale,
Year after year; in no propitious gale,
His lilied banner held its homeward way,
And science saddened at her martyr's stay.

An age elapsed: no wreck told where or when
The chief went down with all his gallant men ;
Or whether by the storm and wild sea flood
He perished, or by wilder men of blood:

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