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THE FATHER'S CURSE-A VILLAGE

TALE.

BY EDWARD W. Cox.

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I WELL remember, many years ago,
How we had gather'd under the elm tree,-
A noisy group, to gambol and to laugh
The summer noon away. But scarcely then
The dial of my life had told ten years,
And I was fickle as the mountain breeze,
And fearless as the inexperienced lamb
That hath not learned to know what danger is.
With a few village children, like myself
Sipping of life's full cup, I sat and smiled,
Because a smile was pleasure's messenger,
And not for any joy, unless it were
That we unconsciously reflected it

From the eye-cheering flowers that deck'd the place.

With such gay prattle we consumed the hours As childhood's unform'd intellect may well

The pilgrim heard us patiently, and traced With his strong staff strange characters in the dust,

Which were no sooner written than erased. From his sunk eyes the tears fell long and fast;

The faithful dog redoubled his caress,And we, with childhood's pity, pluck'd some flowers

And offered them to the poor weak old man.

He kiss'd the smiling jewels of the field And thrust them in his bosom; then to us He beckon'd to draw nigh, saying that he Had somewhat to relate which after years Perchance might profit by. Then thus he spake.

"I had a father once-but in the grave He lies and sleeps most calm and pleasantly.

I had a mother too-but she with him

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"Then much he question'd me of those to whom

My hours were dedicate; and many threats, From his own anguish'd spirit and the book That lay before him, he shower'd down on me. But I, being drunken, answered angrily,

Approve, but which declare the unfolding Dwells in the churchyard. 'Twas my fate And, when the old man urged reproaches

mind,Like the grey buds in early spring, ere yet. Their winter vestments they have shaken off, But which proclaim the promise of the year.

Thus were we gather'd, when there came to us

An old-old man, whose hair was very grey,
His face all wither'd, and his palsied limbs
Shaking like aspen leaf in the night air.
A rudely fashioned staff a little dog,
That seem'd to share his sorrows, were the
sole

Companions of his pilgrimage. The man
Sat himself down upon a rustic seat
That hospitable hands had framed, and known
To all the country as the "Traveller's Rest."
Reclining there, he wiped his furrow'd brow
Which the hot sun had kiss'd too rudely, and
Opening his scrip he took a hard brown crust,
Of which he gave the dog a part, and part
Reserved to his own share. The faithful brute
Lick'd the thin hand that minister'd to him,
And then, methought, a small unconscious

tear

On the grey lashes of the old man lay.

He asked us many things of Lydford Green,
(The village where we dwelt) and of the men
Who tenanted its cottages; and much
He queried of an unfrequented place,
Whither none dared after nightfall to go,
And which was called by us "the Father's
Curse."

It was a strange, secluded spot, far down
Amid the valley, and through a thick wood
Your path must be ere you arrive at it:
A low and half dismantled ruinous wall
Clasp'd in the firm embraces of the weed
That, like pale envy, feeds upon the fallen,
First meets your eye; and if through the rude
gate

to be

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His jealous care;-then he would set me down
Upon some mossy hedge-row or the green
Gay mantle of the field, and in rude phrase
Would hold sweet converse about holy things-
God and the Saviour's love, and seraph forms
That wander on the earth, hymning such
strains

As on the grossness of our mortal ears
May tremble, but the dull sense waken not-
He told me too how after death our souls
Shall be like angels, and then was I glad;
And afterwards methought all things around
Look'd gayer, lovelier, heavenlier than before.
For a good man my father was, and served
His God in spirit and in truth, and read
His holy word, when round the cheerful fire
We sat and smiled the winter nights away."
I was his pride-his joy-and every morn
And every evening did he offer up,

On bended knee, a prayer that heaven would pour

Its choicest blessings on my head; and so
Years past, and I grew up and he grew old.

"But I was prone to evil in my youth,
And bad companions lured me to forsake
The ways of virtue ;-long my father closed
The eyes of love upon my gathering guilt,-
And long he wept-entreated, but in vain.
The seeds of piety that in my heart
He had implanted were all rooted up,

You go, a garden overgrown with grass
And flowers that have sprung up untrain'd and And, in their stead, the tall rank weeds of vice
wild,

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Flourish'd and flung their shadows o'er my soul.

"It was a chilly night, and, by a star That twinkled in the middle heaven, I knew That darkness had done half its work. The frost

Had bound the breezes up, and on the clouds
Laid its cold finger that they moved not, but
Like spectres stood upon the spangled sky.
I was returning from a revel, flush'd
With the strong drink, that, though it made
me mad,

Deprived me not of feeling, thought, or sense.
I gain'd our cottage door, and enter'd it-
My father sat before the fire alone,
For my poor mother, having anxiously
Counted the distant clock till it toll'd twelve,
Being worn out with watching, went to rest.
An open Bible on the table lay,
And, by the burning redness of his eye,
I could perceive he had been weeping much.
He tried to frown upon me, but could not,
Nature so work'd within him; but he pass'd
His hand across his unsmooth brow and swept
A tear from the grey lashes.

much,

I struck him;-yes-I struck him;-strucklike this.

With a loud groan he fell back from his seat; My head grew giddy and my brain whirl'd round;

I saw-I think I saw-great drops of blood
Red, fiery red, upon the hearthstone glare.
I heard a rushing, as if hell were loosed,
And howling fiends:-I sallied from the cot,
And the cold night breathed very bleak on me.

"Upon the many twinkling face of Heaven A change had been since last I look'd on it. The winds had broken loose, and in their rage Swept over the thick wood, and through the cliff's

And passes of the perpendicular mountain scream'd,

Singing most drearily. The cheerful stars
Were all erased,-save that one star alone
Of which I spake as showing me the hour.
Upon the wind's wings rode enormous clouds
That flung their drifting fleeces to the earth
And clothed it with a soft white mantle. Still
The howlings echoed in mine ears, and still
I saw the red drops blazing in mine eye,
And still my brain spun round. The gather'd

snows

Received my hasty feet and wore the print
Of what had trodden them;-I turn'd and
cursed

The tell-tale fleeces, and, in my despair,
Went back to sweep away the imprinted marks,
And so made others;-then I thought indeed
That God had set his curse upon my brow,
And that the earth bore witness of my crime;
A burning weight did sit upon my brain;-
Iran-I flew-the fierce winds beat on me-
The snow-storms swept my cheeks, but could
not quench
The fire that made me mad.

"Then morning came And found me flying still, unconscious where; And evening kiss'd the hills,-and morn again Hung out his lamp, ere, in the dwelling-place Of man, I dared to ask a little food.

"At length I came to the sea-shore where ships

Rode the white-crested waves, and multitudes
Of weeping warriors to their mother earth
Lisp'd an adieu,a few brief moments more
I was a soldier and upon the sea-
Alone,-unfriended, desolate,-aceurst.

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So till the pale star mingled with the morn,
I watch'd its travelling, and in the ship
I was accounted mad.

"At length we gain'd

The port, and, though my comrades all rejoiced,

Yet I did not rejoice, for sea or shore,
City or desert, was the same to me.
Into uncivilized places then we pass'd,
Where dwelt wild men-untutor'd savages,-
With whom we waged incessant war, and
woke

The voice of the proud cannon in the woods
And in the mountain solitudes, that before
Had never heard but Heaven's artillery.
The battle was a bliss to me,-for there
I hoped to die; and into the thick

Of clubs and spears, like a distracted man,
I rush'd, and of the poison'd arrow ask'd
For pity and destruction;-but in vain.
The weapons hiss'd about me in the air,-
And hostile crowds encircled me, but none
Answer'd my invocations;-'twas as if
On me as upon Cain a mark were set
Whereby I might be known.

"At length there came One to us from my country, and perchance In passing talk he told how he had seen And known my birth-place ;-nay, that but of late

He had beheld it. Then my cheek grew pale,
And my heart smote within me at the name,-
And (for none knew me), hesitating much,
1 ask'd of its inhabitants. The man
Then said how an unnatural son had hurl'd
His father from the seat whereon he sat,
And stricken him so, that they who found him
there,

Bathed in his own blood, did believe him dead.
But that they put him on a couch and tried
Their rustic surgery, so that at length
His eyes he open'd and look'd on the light,
And shriek'd and call'd upon his wretched boy,
Curses and prayers commingling in strange

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Was mighty in the land, and had a wife
Whose virtues would put many to the blush
In this our Christian country; and they shone
Amid the rudeness of those savage tribes
Like a green-inantled tree by traveller seen
Alone upon the desert. She bewail'd
My piteous state, and, as a mother kind,
Tended me, ministering wholesome food
And simple medicines such as herbs will make.
Then to a cavern in the forest shades
She led me, signifying that her lord
Had destin'd me for sacrifice. At night
Thither she came, laden with delicate meats,
And, having sooth'd my hurts, departed
straight.

In these deep solitudes my thoughts were turn'd

Upon my father and the blood-red drops;→→
And every night I sat upon the turf

While the dews dropp'd around me, and distill'd

On my uncover'd head;—and on that star
Bent an unswerving glance, till it went down
Behind the hill-top,-for in that far place
Low in the heaven its highest travel was;
And every night, methought, the dreadful deed
I acted o'er again.

""Twas whilst I kept
This awful vigil, that my Indian friend
Once came to me, in her hand carrying
A little book that had been spoil'd, she said,
From my fierce countrymen, and knowing not
The use of it herself, she deem'd it best
To give it to my care.

"I read that book,. And from that moment was a better man; The visions came no more, and though sometimes

I could not but go gaze upon the star,
After a little while it vanish'd all

From the revolving vault. Peace came again,
Though pleasure could not, and for God's good
time
I waited patiently.

"When I was well The Indian bade me go, and pointed out The way which I should traverse. Many tears We shed at parting, and the woman wept, 'Because,' she said,' I was so like her son Who dwelt in the far country of the dead.' After much toil and travel I return'd

To where lived civilized man, and there abode
In penitence. Children, what book was that
Which shed so soft a balm on my despair?
It was the BIBLE.

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Rousseau, Voltaire, our Gibbon, and de Stael,
Leman! these names are worthy of thy shore,
Thy shore of names like these; wert thou no more,
Their memory thy remembrance would recall!
Byron.

LAUSANNE is a neat picturesque town, about eight hours' drive from Geneva, and is deservedly celebrated for the singular beauty of its situation. The climate is salubrious and delightful, and the romantic scenery of the Pays de Vaud has not its equal in the world. Nothing can surpass the glowing magnificence of a summer's evening in this fairy region. When the sun descends beyond mount Jura, the alpine summits reflect for a long time the bright ruddy splendour, and the quiet lake, unruffled by a breeze, assumes the appearance of liquid gold. In the distance rises the vast chain of Alps, with their seas of ice and boundless regions of snow, contrasted with the near and more pleasing objects of glowing vineyards and golden corn-fields, and interspersed with the wooded brow, the verdant and tranquil valley, with villas, hamlets, and sparkling

streams.

Rousseau expresses his rapture at this scene, in the person of the hero of his celebrated romance, who, returning from a voyage round the world, thus exclaims at the sight of his native Pays de Vaud, "Ce paysage unique, le plus beau dont l'œil humain fut jamais frappé, ce séjour charmant auquel je n'avais rien trouvé d'égal dans le tour du monde."

Lausanne is the capital of the Pays de Vaud. The church is a magnificent gothic building, and was the cathedral when the country was subject to the dukes of Savoy. It was taken from the house of Savoy by the canton of Bern, under whose dominion it remained for nearly two centuries and a half, until the French revolution altered the whole face of affairs in Europe. Switzerland caught the cry of liberty and equality, and the government of Bern, which had hitherto been vested in an aristocracy, was transferred to a representative council, chosen by the people.

The inhabitants of Lausanne are Calvinists, although none of that mortifying spirit is discernible which characterizes their brother Presbyterians of Scotland. The only point on which they appear to feel the necessity of a strict observance is the time of divine service on the Sabbath day. Every thing then is as quiet and still as though all classes were convinced of the necessity of, at least, an appearance of religious duty, and few persons are seen in the streets, unless on their way to church. But so soon as the services are ended, the day is devoted to gaiety and recreation. As in France, the neighbouring places of amusement are crowded with visiters, and every thing exhibits a more than usual appearance of gaiety. Their festivities, however, are conducted on a more moderate scale; for great attention is paid by the government to repress the growth of luxury which, despite of the endeavours of the Swiss republicans, is making a rapid progress. Many of the foreign residents find it extremely difficult to accommodate their habits to the regulations imposed on the inhabitants, and sometimes incur the penalties awarded in cases of infringement of their sumptuary laws.

Lausanne, in addition to the natural beauties with which it so richly abounds, derives new interest from the associations to which it gives rise.

The house of Gibbon, one of the most attractive objects at Lausanne, is visited by every stranger. To this retreat he retired to complete those great historical labours which have immortalized his name. The little impression which he had made in public life-the loss of his seat at the Board of Trade-and the neglect of the coalition ministry, who "counted his vote on the day of battle, but overlooked him in the division of the spoil;" all seemed to rendor his voluntary banishment desirable; while his attachment to the society and scenery of Lausanne, and his intimate acquaintance with the people and the language, gave that banishment almost the air of a restoration to his native country. Familiar as he had been with the society of the learned, the noble, and the great, he valued it too correctly to mourn over its loss. "Such lofty connexions," he observes, "may attract the curious and gratify the vain; but I am too modest, or too proud to rate my own value by that of my associates; and whatever may be the fame of learning or genius, experience has shown me that the cheaper qualifications of politeness and good sense are of more useful currency in the commerce of life." The historian's choice was well made, nor did it subject him to repentance. "Since my establishment at Lausanne," he says, seven years have elapsed, and if every day has not been equally soft and serene, not a day, not a moment has occurred in which I have repented of my choice."

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In a letter addressed to Madame Severy, during his visit to England in 1787, he expresses very beautifully, his attachment to his Swiss residence, and the pain which he had experienced in leaving it.

Je perdrois de vue cette position unique sur la terre, ce lac, ces montagnes, ces riants côteaux; ce tableau charmant, qui paroit toujours nouveau aux yeux mêmes accountumés dès leur enfance à le voir. Je laissois ma bibliothèque, la terrasse, mon berceau, une maison riante, et tous ces petits objets de commodité journalière que l'habitude nous rend si ne

the sky was serene, the silver orb of the moon was reflected from the waters, and all nature was silent. I will not dissemble the first emo

cessaires; et dont l'absence nous fait à tous momens sentir la privation. Sur tous les pays de l'Europe, j'avois choisi pour ma retraite le Pays de Vaud, et jamais je ne me suis repéntétions of joy on the recovery of my freedom, un seul instant de ce choix."

During his residence at Lausanne, Gibbon in general devoted the whole of the morning to study, abandoning himself in the evening to the pleasures of conversation, or to the lighter recreation of the card-table. "By many," he observes, "conversation is esteemed as a theatre or a school; but after the morning has been occupied with the labours of the library, I wish to unbend rather than to exercise my mind, and in the interval between tea and supper I am far from disdaining the innocent amusement of

a game at cards."

In a letter to his kind and excellent relative, Mrs. Potter, Gibbon has described what he terms the "skeleton of his life at Lau

sanne."

"In this season (the winter) I rise, not at four in the morning, but a little before eight; at nine I am called from my study to breakfast, which I always perform alone in the English style, and with the aid of Caplin I perceive no difference between Lausanne and Bentinck street. Our mornings are usually passed in separate studies; we never approach each other's door without a previous message, or thrice knocking, and my apartment is already sacred, and formidable to strangers. I dress at half past one, and at two (an early hour, to which I am not perfectly reconciled) we sit down to dinner. We have hired a female cook, well skilled in her profession and accustomed to the taste of every nation, as, for instance, we had excellent mince-pies yesterday. After dinner, and the departure of our company, one, two, or three friends, we read together some amusing book, or play at chess, or retire to our rooms, or make visits, or go to the coffee-house. Between six and seven the assemblies begin, and I am oppressed only with their number and variety. Whist at shillings or half-crowns is generally the game I play, and I play three rubbers with pleasure. Between nine and ten we withdraw to our bread and cheese, and friendly converse, which sends us to bed at eleven; but these sober hours are too often interrupted by private or numerous suppers, which I have not the courage to resist, though I practise a laudable abstinence at the best furnished tables."

The gifted conversation and kind manners of Gibbon attracted the friendship of some of the most estimable of his neighbours, and in the society of the family of De Severy he found some consolation for the loss of his friend Dey

verdun.

"Amongst the circle of my acquaintance at Lausanne I have gradually acquired the solid and tender friendship of a respectable family: the four persons of whom it is composed are all endowed with the virtues best adapted to their age and situation; and I am encouraged to love the parents as a brother, and the children as a father. Every day we seek and find the opportunities of meeting; yet even this valua ble connexion cannot supply the loss of domes tic society." It was indeed this feeling of solitude and loneliness which "tinged with a browner shade the evening of his life." After enumerating, with the pride and partiality which its comforts and its beauties justified, the many advantages of his literary retreat, he touchingly adds-but I feel, and with the decline of years I shall more painfully feel, that I am alone in Paradise."

The summer-house in which the great historian completed his lengthened labours may still be seen. "It was on the day," says he, "or rather night, of the 27th of June, 1787, between the hours of eleven and twelve, that I wrote the last lines of the last page in a summer-house in my garden. After laying down my pen, I took several turns in a berçeau, or covered walk of acacias, which commands a prospect of the country, the lake, and the mountains. The air was temperate,

and perhaps the establishment of my fame; but my pride was soon humbled, and a sober melancholy was spread over my mind by the idea that I had taken an everlasting leave of an old and agreeable companion, and that whatsoever might be the future date of my history, the life of the historian must be short and precarious."

The sentiment of regret thus breathed by Gibbon has been no less beautifully expressed in the verse of Lord Byron, who has made Tasso

lament in the same spirit over the dismissal of

the Jerusalem:

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And wooed me from myself with thy sweet sight,

Thou too art gone, and so is my delight;
And therefore do I weep and inly bleed
With this last bruise upon a broken reed.

The terrace which the historian used to perambulate still remains. Here, not unfrequently, he was accustomed to walk and converse with the distinguished strangers who sought him in his retreat. In one of his letters to Lady Sheffield, he has recorded, with excusable pride, a memorable assemblage of rank and of talent upon his terrace. "A few weeks ago, I was walking on our terrace with M. Tissot, the celebrated physician; M. Mercier, the author of the Tableau de Paris; the Abbé Raynal; Monsieur, Madame, and Mademoiselle Necker; the Abbé de Bourbon, a natural son of Louis XV.; the hereditary Prince of Brunswick, Prince Henry of Prussia, and a dozen counts, barons, and extraordinary persons, amongst whom was a natural son of the Empress of Russia.-Are you satisfied with the list, which I could enlarge and embellish without departing from the truth?"

When visited by M. Simond, a few years since, the house of Gibbon exhibited symptoms of dilapidation and decay. "The principal rooms are now used as a counting-house; the few trees on the terrace have been cut down, and the grounds below are very littery" (we copy the English version, and M. Simond was his own translator), "and planted with shabby fruit-trees, but were no doubt better in Gibbon's time, yet it could never have been any great things; you go down to this terrace by a long flight of narrow stone stairs inside the house, as if to a cellar; the terrace itself is a mere slip, seventy or eighty yards long, by ten in width, with a low parapet wall towards the prospect. An old fashioned arbour of cut charmille (dwarf-beech) at the end of the terrace, encloses the petit cabinet, where Gibbon says he wrote the last lines of his Decline and Fall

of the Roman Empire. It is itself declining and falling into ruin. In short, every thing has been done to disenchant the place."

Lausanne and Ferney as the abodes of Voltaire and of Gibbon, have been finely apostrophised by Lord Byron :

Lausanne and Ferney! ye have been the

abodes

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Of Heaven, again assail'd, if Heaven the while

On man and man's research could deign do more than smile.

The one was fire and fickleness, a child,
Most mutable in wishes, but in mind,
A wit as various,-gay, grave, sage, or
wild,-

Historian, bard, philosopher, combined;
He multiplied himself among mankind,
The Proteus of their talents: but his own
Breathed most in ridicule,-which, as the
wind,

Blew where it listed, laying all things Now to o'erthrow a fool, and now to shake a prone,

throne.

The other, deep and slow, exhausting thought
And hiving wisdom with each studious year,
In meditation dwelt, with learning wrought,
And shaped his weapon with an edge severe,
Sapping a solemn creed with solemn sneer;
The lord of irony,-that master spell,
Which stung his foes to wrath, which grew
from fear,

And doom'd him to the zealot's ready Hell, Which answers to all doubts so eloquently well.

Yet, peace be with their ashes,-for by them,

If merited, the penalty is paid;

It is not ours to judge,-far less condemn; The hour must come when such things shall be made

Known unto all,—or hope and dread allay'd By slumber, on one pillow,-in the dust, Which, thus much we are sure, must lie de

cay'd;

And when it shall revive, as is our trust, "Twill be to be forgiven, or suffer what is just. (To be continued.)

A DREAM OF WORLDS.
BY ROBERT MONTGOMERY.

THOSE Starry wonders, everlasting worlds
Of life and loveliness,-I saw them all,
As on the magic wings of mystery borne
Methought my unembodied spirit swept
Immensity! Vast multitudes there shone
Of beauteous orbs, whose brightness was in-
tense,

Beyond the noon in its most sunny reign.—
Magnificent, along infinity
Of azure, moved these high immortal spheres,
Less terrible in beauty, but more shaped
To mortal vision;-as they onward roll'd,
Each sounded like a world of melody!

'Twas but an eye-glance that such pomp re

vealed:

And yet, before it pass'd a heaven-like host
Of forms and phantoms that can never die,
While mem'ry lives.-Who hath not charm'd
the air

To rapturous delusion?-Who hath lived,
And yet not loved?-and loved, and hath not
shaped

His angel? Who not dream'd a paradise,
For that, which earth and earthliness to none
When from within a glorious longing woke
Supply?-let nature answer; she will tell
What shapes of beauty throng'd a Dream of
Worlds.-

The midnight!-how we gaze upon her pomp
Of orbs, and waft ourselves among their host,
As though they were bright dwellings for the
Soul

When clay doth not corrupt it. Who shall prove

That such are not the palaces of light
Where myriads reap eternity? On high
The seer of old undyingly was rapt
To blessedness: aloft Elijah soar'd,
Whirling in thunder through the sounding
skies,

Enoch.

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'Mid fiery chariots and emblazon'd clouds!-
And He, the sanctifying Lord of life,
Through air ascended to His throne eterne:
Ever hath awe and glory, love, and hope
Divine, the gaze of rapture skyward turn'd.-
And oh! the cold may laugh, the worldly jeer,
Mocking whate'er their miserable clay
Partakes not, of the mind's diviner hue,-
Yet there are dreams of beautifying power
And passion, which a stern reality

Can never reach. Go, ask the widow'd heart
Of young affection, when she walks the night
As in a vision of departed hours,-

If all that day-charms yield can turn her love
To such a blissful heaven of memory,
As that sweet lonely star, whose angel-gaze
Like mercy looks upon her lifted eye!
Or ask the friend, in friendly sorrow left,
When oft the starry wanderers roam the skies,
What radiant solace from their smile is caught,
While Fancy sighing thinks," my friend is
there!"

Ye holy watchers, who this earth have view'd
In darkness rolling on to destiny,
Through many an age, and yet are dimless
still,-

With no feign'd worship sing I your romance.
My boyhood was Chaldean; and your beams
Like rays of feeling quiver'd round my heart!-
Yes, I remember me, when calm and still
My school-companions on their couches slept,
With moon-light on their beautiful young
brows,

Like holiness, arraying them for heaven,
Unhinder'd to my casement I would steal,
And muse, and gaze upon the midnight orbs,
Until my spirit seem'd to float the skies!

Such adoration hath not died away.
For now, when weary of the heartless stir
Around me, and the nothings which o'erwhelm
The daylight, and disease our nobler mind;-
When sadden'd by unkindness, or deceived
By finding clouds where sunshine should pre-
vail;

In such dark mood, upon those peaceful worlds
That shame us with their bright sublimity,
I gaze, and woo unheavenly fancy off

By visioning eternity.-This earth
Too great a burden on our spirit lays,
We bow before our idols, and adore

The glittering falsehood of her fading scene;
Forgetful of yon glorious sky, where, day
And night, Divinity is marching forth,
In sun and darkness, thunder or in worlds!
We know not what these heaven-illuming orbs
May be; to us,-but mysteries that roll
And shine. Yet none upon them ever gazed,
Whose eye could gather beauty for the soul,
To feed on, nor within him felt a flush
Of admiration, spreading o'er the mind
Till it became a mirror of delight,
Reflecting back the glory that it hail'd.
How often have I such proud influence caught
When sick of some high festival, where smiles
Are tutor'd till the heart forget to play,
And eyes are beaming with hypocrisy,-
While the soft tongue whose angel accents
fall

In honied sweetness on the flatter'd ear,
Can play the dagger when the moment comes!
How often, tired with such delightless pomp,
I've hail'd my homeward solitary way.
Here, once again the immeasurable sky
Around me, and a starry wilderness
Open and free for spirit to expand,-
With what a worship has my soul return'd
To midnight nature-to itself, and Heaven.

A FADING SCENE.

BY ROBERT MONTGOMERY.

A FADING scene, a fading scene,
Is this false world below;
And not a heart has ever been

"That hath not proved it so! The clouds are dying while we gaze Upon them, young and warm;

And sweet flowers in the summer rays

But perish while they charm.
The trees that woo'd us as we pass'd
With many a leafy strain,
Perchance, bow wither'd by the blast
When visited again.

The music that the soul doth melt,
Like magic from the skies,
Though sweetly heard, and softly felt,
In swiftest echo flies.

Our pleasures are but fainting hues
Reflected o'er the waves,-
Our glories-they are phantom views
That lure us to our graves!
And Beauty, see her mid the crowd,
A night-queen in her bloom;
To-morrow in her maiden shroud,
A martyr for the tomb!

And Love,-how frequent does it mourn
For some remember'd scene;
Or doom'd, in darkness reft or lorn,
To live on what hath been!
And friends,-alas! how few we find
That consecrate their name,
With glowing heart and gen'rous mind
To feed the hallow'd flame.

But should there be some blessed one,
However sad or lone,

Whom dearly we can look upon,

And feel that friend our own,-
The blasting wings of Fate unfold,
They bear him far away;

Or else we mourn him dead and cold,
Companion of the clay!

Oh no! there's nothing on this earth
We fashion or we feel,
But death is mingled with its birth,
And sorrow with its weal.
Then, hail the hour of glorious doom!
That wings my soul away
To regions radiant with the bloom
Of everlasting day!

THE SUMMONS.

BY MISS M. A. BROWNE.

HARK there's a summons-the bugle horn And the trumpet's note on the light wind borne

'Tis echoed back by a thousand hills,
Its voice is swept o'er the distant rills,
And shakes at that summons the river flood,
As though it felt 'twould be stain'd with blood;
For 'tis the signal to come from afar,
And join in the tumult and din of war.
Another summons-a lowly voice,
Yet it makes an innocent heart rejoice:
A red lip at that sound hath smiled-
'Tis a mother calling her only child,
Her child who was laughing the sunny hours
Away in the shadow of leaves and flowers;
And it tottereth away from its verdant screen,
To tell her all wonders its eyes have seen.

Another summons-a voice of love
As well as the last:-from a window above
That fragrant garden a bright eye beams,
Bright from the spirit's happy dreams;
There's a bridegroom calling his promised
bride,

She points to the West, where the stars still ride,

With a blush and a smile, and then to her dress,
That hath yet no gem save her loveliness.

A summons again-a voiceless one,
Yet by the mortal it calleth well known,
A written summons-written on all
The summer flowers before they fall,
Written on the fading brow and eye,
Dimm'd by the touch of mortality-
Fluttering the pulses-shortening the breath-
All feel that summons-the summons of Death.
Know ye another summons shall come-
Piercing the ear in the silent tomb,

Rolling through Heaven-sweeping o'er earth, And bidding the dead and the living stand forth?

Forget it not! ye shall hear its sound When Death your limbs in his chains hath bound;

And forget not when ye shall hear that callBy your deeds on earth ye shall stand or fall.

At the battle of Marengo, General Desaix was struck by a ball at the first charge of his division and died almost instantly. He had only time to say to the young Le Brun, his aid-de-camp," Go, and tell the First Consul, that my only regret in dying is, that I have done nothing for posterity." Thus modest to the last was one of the bravest and best of men the French Revolution has produced. The Austrians were wont to call him the brave, the indefatigable general. The Germans, over whom it was his frequent lot to exercise the rights of conquest, reverenced him as the good Desaix. And the ferocious Arabs, subjugated not more by his valour than by his wisdom, decreed him the sublime title of the just Sultan.

The day before the battle of Marengo, in which his race of glory was thus so early terminated, he observed, somewhat prophetically, to one of his aids-de-camp, "It is a long time since I fought in Europe. The bullets must know me again; something will happen."

When the tidings of his death was brought in the midst of the hottest of the engagement, to Napoleon by whom he was greatly beloved, he was much affected, and it was one of his earliest commands after the victory, that a splendid monument should be erected to the fallen hero, on the top of Mont St. Bernard,

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devoted themselves to the task of insuring a regular course of lectures to youth. Some professorships were, indeed, instituted in the Faculty, but their fee was wretchedly small. The professors were changed every two years, the young doctors being made to occupy these chairs in regular succession. They hastened to get through their drudgery, in order to acquire the title of Regent Doctor, and entering on office without the preparation of study,

BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIR OF M. COR- they retired without having formed themselves

VISART.

BY BARON CUVIER.

JEAN NICOLAS CORVISART was born on the 15th February, 1745, at Dricourt, a village in the department of the Ardennes, whither his father, an attorney at Paris, had retired, during one of those banishments of the parliament, which the quarrels of that body with the clergy so frequently occasioned during the reign of Louis XV. The duties of an attorney, exercised with talent and probity, yielded sure profits, and would have enriched M. Corvisart, the father; but he is said to have had a passion for painting, without knowing much about it, and, what he gained by defending his clients, he laid out in purchasing bad pictures. Being not more skilled in human nature, he, for a long time, persisted in wishing his son to follow his own profession, and kept him for whole days copying law papers. The young man, who was of a lively and ardent disposition, felt that he had been born for less monotonous occupations. A vague uneasiness disquieted him, his law studies became every day more insupportable, and, perhaps, he would have fallen into great irregularities, had he not, on one of those festive rambles in which he indulged himself, whenever he could escape the eye of his father, entered by chance the lecture room of Anthony Petit, one of the most eloquent men who have been professors of anatomy and medicine during the eighteenth century. On hearing the impressive discourse of that master, and attending to the majestic development of ideas, whose novelty equalled their extent, the young Corvisart recognised the profession for which he was designed. He longed to study the animal economy, and for this purpose he determined to be a physician. From this moment, despatching early in the morning the writings which his father had prescribed for him as the work of the day, and requesting the clerks, his companions, to keep his secret, he occupied all the hours that he could spare in attending the lectures of Petit, Louis, Dessault, Vicq d'Azyr, and our estimable fellow member M. Portal. His father at length perceiving his want of assiduity, inquired into the cause of his conduct, and discovered it; but, finding that it was now too late to restrain him, he permitted him to direct his whole attention to his new career. The Academy has possessed many members, whom an irresistible propensity has thus led to escape from the more humble plans which their relations had formed for them, and this perseverance in seeking a profession, in defiance of all obstacles, would undoubtedly be a good test for the choice of one; but how many young persons would be found whom these obstacles would not completely arrest, or who would not enter on courses worse than idleness or irresolution?

The mode of teaching medicine was then very far removed from the extent and regularity which it has since attained. The Faculty of Paris, an ancient body, organized in the middle ages, had scarcely made any change in a system of government that dated back five centuries. With the title of Doctor, all its members received the right of teaching; but they did not become bound to teach. It was only by chance that a sufficient number ever

by practice. Besides, there were no public lectures at the beds of the sick. In order to see a few patients, the students accompanied the elder physicians in their visits; afterwards, when these elder physicians were unwell, or too much busied with practice, they acted for them, and thus they continued, till at length they, too, slowly attained their professional

rank.

M. Corvisart, to whose ardent genius this tedious progress could not fail to be singularly disagreeable, had yet the patience to conform himself to it in every point; but he chose his masters as a man destined to become one himself. Desbois de Rochefort, chief physician of La Charité, and Dessault, chief surgeon of the Hôtel-Dieu, in the healing art two of the most eminent men of their time, became his principal patrons. It is well known that Desbois de Rochefort had the great merit of first showing the example of regularly delivering clinical lectures in his hospital. Under his guidance, M. Corvisart for several years occupied himself in the observation of diseases, and in the opening of bodies. For this task he had a real passion. The melancholy spectacles which it displays, the dangers to which it is liable, neither repelled nor discouraged him. A puncture which he had received while dissecting, brought him almost to the point of death, and he is said to have escaped only through the assiduous care which Dessault lavished on him. He also, at a very early period, delivered in his own house lectures-not on medicine properly so called (for he did not think that so young a doctor could conscientiously do so), but on anatomy and physiology; and his perspicuity and ardour attracted a crowd of hearers. Nothing more was wanting to him, but to be himself at the head of an hospital, where he could freely pursue the views which his growing experience suggested to him. The first masters of the art judged him worthy of one, and he thought himself on the point of attaining this object of his wishes, when a cause the most trifling in the world kept him back for several years. The customs and dress of physicians were scarcely less antique than the system of government of the Faculty.

If Molière had made them lay aside the gown and the pointed cap, they had at least preserved the full-bottomed wig, which no one else any longer wore, and it was on entering into office that they had to muffle themselves in it. It is affirmed that M. Corvisart and M. Hallé were the first who gave the scandal of not assuming it, and that this levity, as it was called, proved very hurtful to them. It is at least certain, that, on the occasion of which we speak, it was the cause of M. Corvisart's disappointment, and that through the person from whom he had least reason to expect it. A celebrated lady, whose husband was the cause, at least the incidental cause, of the greatest innovations that have taken place in France since the establishment of the monarchy, had just founded an hospital, and M. Corvisart ardently wished to obtain the charge of it; but he presented himself in his natural hair, and this innovation she dared not take upon herself to countenance. At the first word she declared to him that her hospital should never have a physician without a wig,

1830.

and it was for him to choose between that head-dress and his exclusion. He preferred keeping his hair.

By a happy contrast, and when probably he had not greater expectations, it was a monk who, on another occasion, did him more justice. On the death of Desbois de Rochefort, which happened in 1788, the superior of the ecclesiastics attached to the Hôpital de la Charité, a man held in great estimation for his wisdom and his zeal in favour of the sick, and who had been daily witness of M. Corvisart's assiduous cares, employed his credit in getting him attached to that house, and succeeded in the endeavour. From this time, M. Corvisart, continuing the clinical instructions of his predecessor, saw all the young physi cians attend his lectures. He excited admiration by possessing in an eminent degree the talent of discovering from the first moment the nature of diseases, and of foreseeing their progress and event. His fellow-practitioners were not slow in doing him full justice, and he was already considered as one of the first masters in the capital, when, in 1795, Fourcroy procured a chair to be founded for him in the New School of Medicine. Two years after, in 1797, he was appointed to the professorship of medicine in the College of France, and there found himself in the capacity of teaching the art in a theoretical point of view, as he had hitherto shown it practically. The same pupils who heard him in the one school explain the general principles, went to see in the other their happy application, and in all things found him correct, ardent, and obliging in the highest de. gree. In every thing his pleasing eloquence, his lively temper, his sure and quick tact, excited the highest admiration. If any one had a feeling of repugnance to an art condemned to witness such melancholy scenes, he had only to hear M. Corvisart for some time to become an enthusiast in it.

Already all Europe rung with his fame, when, in 1802, he was raised to the highest post in his profession, and yet this elevation was not alone the result of his renown. Every one remembers that it was put to the proof, and that, on being called into consultation respecting an affection of the chest, which threatened the chief of the government, he first discovered its cause, and effected its removal.

His success, however, had not inspired him with an explicit faith in medicine. It is even said that the mistakes which, notwithstanding his great sagacity, sometimes happened to him, gave him the greatest vexation, and made him, in those moments of discouragement, speak ill of his art; nor did he like those works in which it was pretended to assign precise characters, and a regular progress to each disease, and from which young persons might form of medicine an idea similar to that afforded by the physical sciences, properly so called, and still less those in which it is presented in a deceitful simplicity, under the idea of referring diseases and remedies to a small number of forms, it was not thus that he viewed it. Organized beings have their certain laws, each of of them conforms to the type of its species; but the disorders which introduce themselves into their organization, are subject to endless combinations; each day this may assume a dif ferent complication; and it is from the whole symptoms of each moment, taken together, that they are to be judged of, and combated. Nor did any one pay more attention to these sensible signs. The best physician, according to him, was he who had succeeded in giving to his senses, the greatest delicacy. He did not attend solely to the pains felt by the patient, to the variations of his pulse, or of his respiration. A painter could not have better distinguishi

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