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phosphorescent brilliancy. As if in a dream the animal polypus awakens in the stone for a moment, and like a dream it crystallizes again into stone. Yet, what no tree on earth, in all its vigor and beauty ever could do, that is accomplished by these strange animal trees. They build large, powerful castles, and high, lofty steeples, resting upon the very bottom of the ocean, rising stone upon stone, and cemented like no other building on this globe.

For they are a strange, mysterious race, these "maidens of the ocean," as the old Greeks used to call them. Their beauty of form and color, their marvellous economy, their gigantic edifices, all had early attracted the attention of the curious, and given rise to fantastic fables; and amusing errors. For centuries the world believed that these bright-colored, delicate flowers, which, out of their element, appeared only humble, brown stones, were real, fragile sea-plants, which the contact with air instantaneously turned into stone. Even the last century adhered yet to this belief, and only repeated and energetic efforts succeeded in establishing their claim to a place in the animal kingdom. Charles Darwin, at last, in the charming account he has given us of his voyages, set all errors aside, and made us familiar with this most wondrous of all creatures.

Now we all know their atolls and coral-rings, filling the warm seas of the tropics with the green crowns of slender palm-trees waving over them in the breeze, and man living securely in their midst. For in vain has he himself tried to protect his lands against the fury of the ocean, in vain has he labored and pressed all the forces of nature, even allpowerful steam into his service. But the minute polypi work quietly and silently, with modest industry, in their never-ceasing struggle with the mighty waves of the sea. A struggle it is, for, strangely enough, they never build in turbid, never in still waters; their home is amid the most violent breakers, and living force, though so minute, triumphs victoriously over the blind, terrible might of furious waves. Thus they build, year after year, century after century, until at last their atolls inclose vast lakes in the midst of the ocean, where eternal peace reigns, undisturbed by the stormy waves and the raging tempest. But when their marvellous structure reaches the surface, it rises no further, for the polypi are true children of the

sea, and as soon as sun and air touch them they die.

Like enchanted islands, these circular reefs of the corals bask in the brightest light of the tropics. A light green ring incloses a quiet inland lake, the ground is white, and being shallow, shines brilliantly in the gorgeous floods of light, whilst without the dark, black billows of the ocean are kept off by a line of breakers, rushing incessantly in white foam against the cliffs; above them an ever pure, deep blue ether; and far beyond, the dark ocean and the hazy air blending at the horizon and melting harmoniously into one another. The effect is peculiarly grand and almost magical, when the coral rings are under water, and the huge, furious breakers toss up their white crests in vast circles around the sill, calm waters within, whilst no land, no rock is seen to rise above the surface of the ocean.

Frequently large reefs, richly studded with graceful palins, surround on all sides lofty mountains, around whose foot there grows a luxuriant, tropical vegetation. Inside of these reefs the water is smooth and mirror-like, basking in the warm sunlight; without, there is eternal warfare; raging, foaming surges swell and rush in fierce attack against the firm wall, besieging it year after year, century after century. Thus, the tiny polypi protect proud man on his threatened island against the destructive flood: polypi struggling boldly against the unmeasured ocean! and if all the nations on earth united, they could not build the smallest of these coral reefs in the ocean -but the corals build a part of the crust of the great earth! For their islands count alone in the South Sea by thousands; all but a few feet above the surface of the sea, which, around, is unfathomable; all ring-shaped, with peaceful lake in the centre; all consisting of no other material but that of still living corals. These islands, built by the industrious polypi under water, are planted and peopled by the same waves, by whom they were raised above highwater mark. The currents bring seed and carry large living trees from distant shores; lizards dwelling in their roots, birds nestling in their branches, and insects innumerable arrive with the tree, and water-birds soon give life to the scanty, little strip of newly made land.

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Thus they meet below, plant and animal; the pale, hueless fucus twining its long, ghastly arms around the bright

scarlet coral, and through their branches glides the nautilus with wide-spread sails. Every ray of light that falls on the surface, changes hue and tinge below. But the deep has lights of its own. There is the glimmer of gorgeous fish in gold and silver armor, the phosphorescent sheen of the milk-white or sky-blue bells of brilliant medusæ, as they pass through the purple-colored tops of lofty fuci, and the bright, sparkling light of tiny, gelatinous creatures, chasing each other along the blue and olive-green hedges of algae and humbler plants. When day fades, and night covers with her dark mantle the sea also, these fantastic gardens begin to shine in new, mysterious light; green, yellow and red flames are seen to kindle and to fade away; bright stars twinkle in every direction, even the darkest recesses blaze up, now and then, in bright flashes of light, and fitful rays pass incessantly to and fro in the wild, dark world beneath the waves. Broad furrows of flashing light mark the track of the dolphins through the midst of the foaming waters. Troops of porpoises are sporting about, and as they cut through the glistening flood, you see their mazy path bright with intense and sparkling light. There also passes the huge moonfish, shedding a pale spectral light from every fin and scale, through the crowd of brilliant starfish, whilst afar from the coast of Ceylon are heard the soft, melancholy accents of the singing mussel, like the distant notes of an Eolian harp, and yet louder than even the breakers on the rocky shore. But the great sea itself is not silent. Listen, and you will hear how the grey old ocean, heaving in a gentle motion, sings in an undertone, chiming in with the great melody, until all the sweet sounds of sea, earth, and air melt into one low voice alone, that murmurs over the weary sea and rises, singing eternal praise, to the throne of Him, who "is mightier than the noise of many waters, ye, than the mighty waves of the sea."

The great botanist, Schleiden, tells us how, off the coast of the island of Sitky, the bottom of the sea is covered with a dense and ancient forests, plant grows close to plant, and branch intertwines with branch. Below, there lies a closely woven carpet of rich hues, made of countless threads of tiny waterplants, red confervæ and brown-rooted mosses, each branching off into a thousand finely traced leaves. On this soft couch the

luxuriant sea-lettuce spreads its broad, elegant leaves, a rich pasture for peaceful snails and slow turtles. Between them shine the gigantic leaves of the Irides in brilliant scarlet or delicate pink, whilst along reef and cliff the dark olivegreen fuci hang in rich festoons, and half cover the magnificent sea-rose in its unsurpassed beauty. Like tall trees the Laminaria spread about, waving in endless broad ribbons along the currents, and rising high above the dense crowd. Alaria send up long naked stems, which at last expand into a huge, unsightly leaf of more than fifty feet length. But the sea-forest boasts of still loftier trees, for the Nereocysti rise to a height of seventy feet; beginning with a coralshaped root, they grow up in a thin, thread-like trunk, which, however, gradually thickens, until its clubshaped form grows into an enormous bladder, from the top of which, like a crest on a gigantic helmet, there waves proudly a large bunch of delicate but immense leaves. These are the palms of the ocean, and these forests grow, as by magic, in a few months, cover the bottom of the sea with a most luxuriant growth, wither and vanish, only to reappear soon again in greater richness and splendor. And what crowds of strange, ill-shapen, and unheard of molluscs, fish, and shellfish more among them! Here they are huge balls, there many cornered or starlike, then again like long streaming ribbons. Some are armed with large, prominent teeth, others with sharp saws, whilst a few, when pursued, make themselves invisible by emitting a dark vapor-like fluid. Here, glassy, colorless eyes stare at you with dull, imbecile light,-there, deep blue or black eyes glare with almost human sense and unmistakable cunning. Through bush and through thicket there glide the hosts of fierce, gluttonous robbers who fill the vast deep. But not only the animals of the ocean pasture and hunt there; man also stretches out his covetous hand and demands his share.

Proud ships with swelling sails disdain not to arrest their bird-like flight, to carry off vast fucus-forests which they have torn up from the bottom of the sea, in order to manufacture kelp or iodine from the ashes, or to fish at the peril of their lives for bright corals in the depth. In the streets of Edinburgh the cry of "buy pepper-dulse and tangle" is heard in our day, and the Irish fisherman boldly faces death to snatch a load.

of Carraghen-moss from the rapid current. The poor peasant of Normandy gathers the vast heaps of decaying fuci, which wind and wave have driven to his shore, in order to carry them painfully, miles and miles, as manure on his fields, and the so-called sheep-fucus supports the flocks and herds of cattle in many a Northern island in Scotland and in Norway, through their long, dreary winters. The men of Iceland and of Greenland diligently grind some farinaceous kind of fucus into flour and subsist, like their cattle, upon this strange wood for many months, whilst their wives follow Paris fashion, and rouge themselves with the red flower of the purple fucus.

Here, however, one of the great mysteries which the ocean suggests, startles the thinking observer. For whom did the Almighty create all this wealth of beauty and splendor? Why did He conceal the greatest wonders, the most marvellous creations of nature under that azure veil, the mirror-like surface of which reflects nearly every ray of light and mostly returns, as if in derision, the searcher's own face as his only reward?

But because all the varied forms, all the minute details are not seen, is therefore the impression, which the ocean produces on our mind, less striking or less permanent? We count not the stars in heaven, we see even but a small number of all, and yet the starry sky has never failed to lift up the mind of man to his Maker. So with the ocean. His way is in the sea, and His path in the great waters. The voice of the Lord is upon the waters; the Lord is upon many waters. From olden times the ocean has ever been to the nations of the earth the type of all that is great, powerful, infinite. All the fictions of the Orient and Eastern India, all the myths of Greece of the "earth embracing Okeanos," and even the Jewish tradition that "the earth was without form and void, and the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters," speak of the sea as the great source of all life, the very dwelling-place of the Infinite.

There are nations who never see the ocean. How dream-like, how fantastic are their ideas of the unknown world! German poetry abounds with wild, fanciful dreams of mermaids and mermen, and even the sailor-nation has its favorite legend of the ancient mariner, and a Tennyson has sung of fabled mer

men and their loves. But truly has it been said that "they that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters, these see the works of Jehovah and his wonders in the deep."

Uniform and monotonous as the wide ocean often appears, it has its changes and is now mournful, now cheery and bright. Only when the wind is lulled and a calm has soothed the angry waves, can the ocean be seen in its quiet majesty. But the aspect is apt to be dreary and lonely; whether we see the dark waves of the sea draw lazily in and out of rocky riffs, or watch wearily "the sea's perpetual swing, the melancholy wash of endless waves." Away from the land there is nothing so full of awe and horror as a perfectly calmn sea: man is spell-bound, a magic charm seems to chain him to the glassy and transparent waters; he cannot move from the fatal spot, and death, slow, fearful, certain death stares him in the face. He trembles as his despairing gaze meets the upturned, leaden eye of the shark, patiently waiting for him, or as he hears far below the sigh of some grim monster, slowly shifting on his uneasy pillow of brine. Fancy knows but one picture more dreadful yet than tempest, shipwreck, or the burning of a vessel out at sea: it is a ship on the great ocean in a calm, with no hope for a breeze. Wild and waste is the view. On the same sunshine, over the same waves the poor mariners gaze day by day with languid eye, even until the heart is sick and the body perishes.

At other times it is the gladsome ocean, full of proud ships, merry waves and ceaseless motion, that greets the eye. Then the wild, shoreless sea, on which the waves have rolled for thousands of years in unbroken might, fills the mind with the idea of infinity, and thought, escaping from all visible impression of space and time, rises to sublimest contemplations. Yet, the sight of the clear, transparent mirror of the ocean, with its light, curling, sportive waves, cheers the heart like that of a friend, and reminds us that here, as upon the great sea of life, even when the wrecked mariner has been cast among the raging billows, an unseen hand has often guided him to a happy shore. For He ruleth the raging of the sea: when the waves thereof rise, He stilleth them.

This sense of the Infinite, suggested and awakened by the vast expanse of restless and uneasy waters is, however,

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not unmixed with a feeling of deep mysterious awe. The mind cannot seize nor comprehend this boundless grandeur; hence its mysteriousness. The eye cannot see, no sense can, in fact, perceive the connection between the stupendous phenomena on the wide ocean and the fate of man. To human eyes the surging billows and the towering waves are both raised by an invisible, unknown power, and their depth is peopled with beings uncouth, ungoverned and unknown. The sea is lonely, the sea is dreary, like a wide, watery waste compared with the gay, bright colors of the land, and the might of gigantic waves that rush from age to age against the bulwarks of continent and isle, seems irresistible and able to destroy the world's foundation. Thus the ocean awakens in us feelings of dark mystery and grim power; the Infinite carries us off beyond the limits of familiar thought, and the sea becomes the home of fabled beings and weird images. All sea-shore countries teem with stories, legends and traditions; the fickle sea, the envious ocean, the fierce, hungry waves, the furious breakers, all become the representatives of so many human passions. Our fancy peoples the ocean with sweet, luring sirens, endowed with magic power to weave a spell and to draw the yielding mariner down to the green crystal halls beneath the waves. There sea-kings and morgana fairies live in enchanted palaces; monsters of unheard size and shape flit ghostlike through that

dark, mysterious realm, and huge snakes trail themselves slowly from "their coiled sleep in the central deep, amidst all the dry pied things that lie in the hueless mosses under the sea." The bewildered and astounded mind tries, in his own way, to connect the great phenomena of nature with his fate and the will of the Almighty. It sees in homeless, restless birds the harbingers of the coming storm, in flying fishes the spirits of wrecked seamen, and points to the Flying Dutchman and the Ancient Mariner as illustrations of the justice of God's wrath.

The strong mind, the believing soul, of course, shake off all such idle dreams and vain superstitions. To them the sea is the very source of energy and courage. The life at sea is a life of unceasing strife and struggle. Hence all sea-faring nations are warlike, fond of adventures, and poetical. But the sea's greatest charm is, after all, its freedom. The free, unbounded ocean, where man feels no restraint, sees no narrow limits, where he must rely upon his own stout heart, strong in faith, where he is alone with his great Father in heaven, gives him a sense of his own freedom and strength like no other part of earth, and makes him return to the sea, its perils and sufferings, in spite of all the peace and happiness that the land can afford him. He knows that even if he dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there shall His hand lead him and His right hand shall hold him.

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WAS NAPOLEON A DICTATOR?

APOLEON, it may be stated without venture, is one of those historical magnitudes, which attract the renewed scrutiny, and periodically revived attention of successive ages. Does he also belong to those who present themselves for centuries in different phases, according to the different and characteristic elements which may be at work in the wrestling progress of the race to which they have belonged?

Public men are open to the gaze of all; and people will have their opinions about them. We heard Niebuhr exclaim: "How true! How wise!" when on one of the high roads of Tyrol, we passed a house, over the door of which was painted the distich:

"Wer da bauet un der Strassen,

Muss die Leute reden lassen."*

Nor must we forget the wise saying of Goethe, that it does not require an architect to live in a house.

The greater a name is among those that are stamped as historical, the surer it is to be discussed and examined from various points of view, and to present itself in different lights and hues in the sequel of years. Indeed, may it not be said that, as it is one of the characteristics of a great soul, that it lives within itself the lives of many men; so it is the variety of phases which a name, an epoch, a nation, or an institution, presents to succeeding generations, that constitutes one of the standards of historical greatness? Like great books, new eras find something new in them, and they grow on mankind. Christ became man; as such, the greatest man, and his name presents itself in endless phases to generation after generation. Timour and Attila did vast things for the times, but there is but one unchanging aspect in which they can be viewed. They were nothing but conquerors. Greece is studied with intenser zeal as our race advances, and always with the relish of a newly-discovered subject. Even the middle of the nineteenth century has produced several important and elaborate histories of that brilliant star in history. Portugal had a brilliant period, too; but it is like one flash of light, and there it ends. No successive ages present it in a new aspect. The institutions of the Anglican

race are an inexhaustible theme of reflection, and wou'l be so for all ages to come, even if this day the Americans and English were swept from the face of the earth. Russia is a vast empire. Describe it once with accuracy and truth, or, when it will have crumbled into dust, let its rise and fall be carefully chronicled, and all is done that mankind stand in need of, or will care for.

But

Napoleon was a great man. Whether that whole phenomenon comprehended within the one name, Napoleon Bonaparte, will have in future ages the polyphasial character which has just been spoken of, cannot be decided in our times, whatever the anticipations of present historians may be, according to the different bias of their minds. the period is arriving when his history may be written. We are daily receding from his time, and ascending the summit from which the historian may calmly look around. It is not the contemporaries that can write the history of a man or age. They can only accumulate materials. Niebuhr wrote a wiser history of Rome than Livy; Grote, a deeper history of Greece than Thucydides or Herodotus. In the meantime, separate questions are to be answered; distinct subjects belonging to the great theme are gradually to be treated with more and more of that character with which, ultimately, his whole history must be handled. One of these questions isand it is a vital one-was Napoleon a dictator? Did he consciously concentrate immense power, compress freedom of action in France, and conquer the European continent, merely to prepare a nobler and a permanent state of things? Did he sow and plant, or did he merely concentrate power, and, in doing so, destroy the germs of freedom? Did he treat liberty as merely in abeyance, while, nevertheless, he was fostering its germs, or did he induce a state of things, which, in the same degree as he succeeded, extirpated freedom, and which in turn must be undone in the same degree in which liberty would struggle into existence? The Roman dictator was no annihilator. He received extraordinary, not absolute, power, for a limited period, in times of danger and difficulty, to help the wheels

He who builds where people walk,
Must allow the folk to talk.

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