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we are none of us grate hands at the pen; 't is stir to show that he is not governed by a woman, as well I make this my copie-booke. wille make things worse. Meanwhile, how woulde I have them? Am I most pleased or payned? dismayed or flattered? Indeed I know not.

* Oh, strange event! Can this be happinesse? Why, then am I soe feared, soe mazed, soe prone to weeping? I woulde that mother were here. Lord have mercie on me a sinfulle, sillie girl, and guide my steps arighte.

* It seemes like a dreame, (I have done naughte but dreame of late, I think,) my going along y matted passage, and hearing voices in my father's chamber, just as my hand was on y° latch; and my withdrawing my hand, and going softlie away, though I never paused at disturbing him before; and, after I had beene a fulle hour in ye stille room, turning over ever soe manie trays full of dried herbs and flower-leaves, hearing him come forthe and call, "Moll; deare Moll; where are you?" with I know not what of strange in y tone of his voice; and my running to him hastilie, and his drawing me to his chamber, and closing y doore. Then he takes me round ye waiste, and remains quite silent awhile; I gazing on him so strangelie! and at length, he says with a kind of sigh," Thou art indeed but young yet! scarce seventeen-and fresh, as Mr. Milton says, as the earlie May; too tender, forsooth, to leave us yet, sweet child! But what wilt say, Moll, when I tell thee that a well-esteemed gentleman, whom as yet indeed I know too little of, hath craved of me access to y house as one that woulde win your favour?"

ent."

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I am soe sorry to have swooned. Needed I have done it, merelie to heare there was one who soughte my favour? Aye, but one soe wise! so thoughtfulle soe unlike me!

Bedtime; same daye.

Who knoweth what a daye will bring forth? After writing y above, I sate like one stupid, ruminating on I know not what, except on y unlikelihood that one so wise would trouble himselfe to seeke for aught and yet fail to win. After abiding a long space in mine owne chamber, alle below seeming still, I began to wonder shoulde we dine alone or not, and to have a hundred hot and cold fitts of hope and feare. Thought I, if Mr. Milton comes, assuredlie I cannot goe down; but yet I must; but yet I will not; but yet y best will be to conduct myselfe as though nothing had happened; and, as he seems to have left the house long ago, maybe he hath returned to Sheepscote, Oh that London! Shall I or even to London. indeede ever see it? and y rare shops, and yo playhouses, and St. Paul's, and y Towre? But what and if that ever comes to pass? Must I leave home? dear Forest Hill? and father and mother. and y boys? more especiallie Robin? Ah! but father will give me a long time to think of it. He will, and must.

Then dinner-time came; and with dinner-time, uncle Hewlett and Ralph, Squire Paice and Mr. Milton. We had a huge sirloin, soe no feare of short commons. I was not ill pleased to see soe manie; it gave me an excuse for holding my peace, but I could have wished for another woman. However, father never thinks of that, and mother will soone be home. After dinner y elder men went to y bowling-greene with Dick and Ralph; the boys to y fish-ponds; and, or ever I was aware, Mr. Milton was walking with me on the terrace. My dreame came soe forcibly to mind, that my heart seemed to leap into my mouth; but he kept away from y fish-ponds, and from leavetaking, and from his morning discourse with my father

Thereupon, such a suddain faintness of y' spiritts overtooke me, (a thing I am noe way subject to,) as that I fell down in a swound at father's feet; and when I came to myselfe agayn, my hands and feet seemed full of prickles, and there was a humming, as of Rose's bees, in mine ears. Lettice and Margery were tending of me, and father watching me full of care; but soe soone as he saw me open mine eyes, he bade the maids stand aside, and sayd, stooping over me, "Enough, dear Moll, we will talk noe more of this at pres"Onlie just tell me," quoth I, in a whisper, who it is." "Guesse," sayd he. "I cannot," I softlie replied; and, with the lie, came such a rush of blood to my cheeks as betraied me. "I am sure you have though," said deare father gravelie," and I neede not say it is Mr. Milton, of whome I know little more than you doe, and that is not enough. On the other hand, Roger Agnew sayth that he is one of whom we can never know too much, and there is somewhat about him which inclines me to believe it." "What will mother say?" interrupted I. There- promise to be his, wholly and trulie.-And oh! at father's countenance changed; and he hastilie I feare I have beene too quickly wonne. answered, "Whatever she likes; I have an answer for her, and a question too;" and abruptlie left me; bidding me keepe myselfe quiet.

But can I? Oh, no! Father hath sett a stone rolling, unwitting of its course. It hath prostrated me in y° first instance; and will, I misdoubt, hurt my mother. Father is bold enow in her absence, but when she comes back will leave me to face her anger alone; or else, make such a

-at least for awhile; but some way he got round to it, and sayd soe much, and soe well, that, after alle my father's bidding me keepe quiete and take my time, and mine owne resolution to think much and long, he never rested till he had changed ye whole appearance of things, and made me

May 23d. At leaste, so sayeth the calendar: but with me it hath beene trulie an April daye, alle smiles and teares. And now my spirits are soe perturbed and dismaid, as that I know not whether to weepe or no, for methinks crying w relieve me. At first waking this morning my mind was elated at y falsitie of my mother's notion, that no man of sense woulde think me worth y having;

and soe I got up too proude, I think, and came down too vain, for I had spent an unusuall time at ye glasse. My spiritts, alsoe, were soe unequall, that y boys took notice of it, and it seemed as though I coulde breathe nowhere but out of doors; so the children and I had a rare game of play in y home close, but ever and anon I kept looking towards y road and listening for horses' feet, till Robin sayd, "One w think yo king was coming." but at last came Mr. Milton quite another way, walking through ye fields with huge strides. Kate saw him firste, and tolde me; and then sayd, "What makes you look soe pale?"

We sate a good space under the hawthorn hedge on y brow of y hill, listening to ye mower's scythe, and the song of birds, which seemed enough for him, without talking; and as he spake not, I helde my peace, till, with y sun in my eyes, I was like to drop asleep; which, as his own face was from me, and towards ye landskip, he noted not. I was just aiming for mirthe's sake to steale away, when he suddainlie turned about and fell to speaking of rural life, happinesse, heaven, and such like, in a kind of rapture; then, with his elbow half raising him from ye grass, lay looking at me; then commenced humming or singing I know not what strayn, but 't was of " begli occhi" and "chioma aurata," and he kept smiling the while he sang.

After a time we went in-doors; and then came my firste pang: for father founde out how I had pledged myself overnighte; and for a moment looked so grave, y' my heart misgave me for having been soe hastie. However, it soone passed off; deare father's countenance cleared, and he even seemed merrie at table; and soon after dinner alle ye party dispersed save Mr. Milton, who loitered with me on y terrace. After a short silence he exclaimed, "How good is our God to us in alle his gifts! For instance, in this gift of love, whereby had he withdrawn from visible nature a thousand of its glorious features and gay colourings, we shoulde stille possess, from within, the means of throwing over her clouded face an entirelie different hue! while as it is, what was pleasing before now pleaseth more than ever! Is it not soe, sweet Moll? May I express thy feelings as well as mine own, unblamed? or am I too adventurous? You are silent; well then let me believe we think alike, and that the emotions of y few laste hours have given such an impulse to alle that is high, and sweete, and deepe, and pure, and holy in our innermoste hearts, as that we seeme now onlie firste to taste y life of life, and to perceive how much nearer earth is to heaven than we thought! Is it soe? Is it soe?" and I was constrayned to say "Yes," at I scarcelie knew what; grudginglie too, for I feared having once alreadie sayd "Yes" too soone. But he saw nought amisse, for he was expecting]

nought amisse; soe went on, most like truth and love that lookes c speake or words sounde. "Oh, I know it, I feel it—henceforthe there is a life reserved for us in which angels may sympathize. For this most excellent gift of love shall enable us to read together y° whole booke of sanctity and virtue, and emulate eache other in carrying it into practice; and as the wise Magians kept theire eyes steadfastlie fixed on y° star, and followed it righte on, through rough and smoothe, soe, we, with this bright beacon, which indeed is set on fire of heaven, shall pass on through y peacefull studdies, surmounted adversities, and victorious agonies of life, ever looking steadfastlie up!"

Alle this, and much more, as tedious to heare as to write, did I listen to, firste with flagging attention, next with concealed wearinesse ;-and as wearinesse, if indulged, never is long concealed, it soe chanced, by ill-luck, that Mr. Milton, suddainlie turning his eyes from heaven upon poor me, caughte, I can scarcelie expresse how slighte, an indication of discomforte in my face; and instantlie a cloud crossed his owne though as thin as that through which y sun shines while it floats over him. Oh, 't was not of a moment! and yet in that moment we seemed eache to have seene y other, though but at a glance, under new circumstances:-as though two persons at a masquerade had just removed theire masques and put them on agayn. This gave me my seconde pang :-I felt I had given him payn; and though he made as though he forgot it directly, and I tooke payns to make him forget it, I coulde never be quite sure whether he had.

* My spiritts were soe dashed by this, and by learning his age to be soe much more than I had deemed it, (for he is thirty-five! Who coulde have thoughte it?) that I had thenceforthe, the aire of being much more discreete and pensive than belongeth to my nature: whereby he was, perhaps, well pleased. As I became more grave he became more gay; soe that we met eache other, as it were, half-way, and became righte pleasant. If his countenance were comely before, it is quite heavenlie now; and yet I question whether my love increaseth as rapidlie as my feare. Surelie my folly will prove as distastefull to him, as his overmuch wisdom to me. The dread of it hath alarmed me alreadic. What has become, even now, of alle my gay visions of marriage, of London, and the play-houses, and the Towre? They have faded away thus earlie, and in their place comes a foreboding of I can scarce say what. I am as if a child, receiving from some old fairy y gift of what seemed a fayre doll's house, shoulde hastilie open y doore thereof, and starte back at beholding nought within but a huge cavern, deepe, high, and vaste; in parte glittering with glorious chrystals, and y rest hidden in obscure darknesse.

For the Living Age.

A CRUISE ON THE LAKES.

BY WM. M. WOOD, M. D., U. S. N.

timbers are, however, fast disappearing in canes, boxes, &c., for the curious in relics. The bell which now regulates the movements of the republicans of the borough, from the belfry of the oldfashioned and shabby looking court-house, once struck the hours and called the watches on board the flag-ship of the British commodore.

This having been one of the line of old French

READER, have you ever been on the great lakes? If you have not your mind will scarcely be able to realize all their wonders;-their vast expanse of cool fresh water—their profound clear depths-the commercial sail and steam navies gliding and foaming over their surface-the elegant cities and thriv-posts attempting to enchain the British possessions, ing nations on their shores. At one point, you are amid the crowded masts and busy bustle of the commerce of an old state, and, in a few hours, you may be where civilization has leaped in full-grown vigor upon the wilderness, and, struggling for a settlement, has planted its cities before the longhaired and painted savage has had time to escape from the brick avenues encroaching upon his foresthome; and, wrapped in their blankets, with the beautifying additions of green and red paint on their faces, and quills and feathers in their hair, we have seen them walking the newly made streets and selling their wares to the new people.

the ruins of the old fort are still to be seen a little to the eastward of the town; and not far from these ruins, on a bluff, overlooking the harbor, stands a block-house, built during the last war with England. Erie was also the burial place of General Anthony Wayne, and when, many years afterwards, his body was disinterred, it was found to be in a state of perfect preservation. Erie is altogether a quiet old-fashioned looking place, and seems to love its antiquity, and be reluctant to tie on to the whirling axis of progress, and to be dragged in the dust and mire of bustle and improvement. For some reason it is far behind its Even though you are accustomed to all the bus-natural advantages. Some say that a splendid tle of the Atlantic cities, and have endeavored to marble monument on its principal street is the conceive some idea of the business and activity of grave-stone which records the death of its proslake towns, the reality will still cause astonish- perity. This monument is a Grecian structure, a ment, as you walk along the wharves of Buffalo- branch of the United States Bank; its vaults are, piled, loaded, and cumbered with merchandise, and of course, now empty, its doors closed, and its see its harbor crowded with steamers and sail- steps grass-grown. vessels, some of which are continually going and coming. Stopping but to glance at these things, to wonder and admire, we take our passage, for the newer regions beyond, in a floating palace of vast Its machinery is elegantly ornamental, and its great and destructive power hidden by the graceful design and finish of art. We tread a saloon carpeted with Brussels, furnished with a rosewood piano, rich mirrors, velvet chairs, sofas, and loungers, and lighted by stained glass in gilded mouldings, while fore and aft we can study some picturesque scene in the paintings of the panels. We sleep on French mahogany bedsteads, while everything in our state-room is in similar relation to the demands of refinement and luxury.

extent.

The tourist, in such a boat as this, keeping along the United States shore of Lake Erie, will probably stop first at the town of Erie, formerly Presque Isle, in Pennsylvania, distant about one hundred miles from Buffalo. This place, with a population of about five thousand, has the most secure and capacious harbor on the lakes. It is formed by a narrow peninsula, which, leaving the main shore, curves round in the shape of a horseshoe, separating the bay of Presque Isle from Lake Erie. The town looks out upon the lake from a commanding bluff, and is overlooked itself by a succession of elevated forest-clad ridges, so that the scenery from the sea or from the shore is commanding. Historical associations of no little interest linger around the spot. Here were built the principal vessels of Perry's victorious squadron, and here, at this day, repose, beneath the waters, the battered remains of his flag-ship, the 'Lawrence." Its blackened and water-soaked

Leaving Erie, our next stopping place will be at the beautiful town of Cleveland, and as we approach it from the east, it shows well on the elevated plain above us, and gives a promise which is fully kept by closer acquaintance. Sixteen or eighteen thousand people, daily increasing, have here placed their tents on the Cuyahoga river. This narrow river has its mouth restricted by proper bounds, and symmetrically carried out into the lake by stone piers; and we run up this river, nearly a mile, between rows of vessels and steamers. The right bank of the river rises to an elevation of eighty feet, and then spreads out into a plain, or table land. Wharves, warehouses, and shops line the immediate edge of the stream at the foot of this hill, but the city proper is on the plain above, and when we have ascended to its level it is cheering to look upon the handsome city which expands before us. The principal business street, Superior, has a width of one hundred and twenty feet, and is well built with brick houses of business, three, four and five stories high. The streets of private residences also have an imposing width, and some of them are like ornamental walks through a succession of country residences, the buildings being in various styles of architecture, from exquisite cottages to colonnaded palaces, and are surrounded by grounds handsomely laid out into gardens of flowers and ornamental shrubbery.

From the lake-side of the city the eye sweeps over the blue waters to the distant horizon, and from the hill brink, on the opposite side, the river is seen winding a serpentine course through meadows and around the base of forest-clad hills.

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Leaving Cleveland, as we proceed to the west- spot, without people or settlement, except that on ward, the bold bluff of the lake shore sinks to a the American side Fort Gratiot frowns upon hoslow beach, and numerous green islands appear tile invasion, and a lighthouse beams its welcome above the watery expanse. Among these islands to the commerce which comes over the blue waters was fought the battle of Lake Erie. It is a beau- of the lake. tiful region with which this proud historical Entering Lake Huron, we are now fairly at sea achievement is associated. The wooded islets rise, upon a fresh water ocean, as geographers tell us, by precipitous limestone banks, from the blue six hundred feet above the Atlantic, with a depth waters. Rounding a rocky fortress-like promontory of three hundred feet below the level of that ocean, of one of these islands called " 'Gibraltar," we and washing the shores of thirty-two thousand islfound ourselves in "Put-in Bay," a secluded and ands. It was early in the morning following that beautiful sheet of water enclosed by "Gibraltar" on which we entered Lake Huron, before we had and two other islands. From the summit of the passed over its nearly three hundred miles of rocky point of " Gibraltar," the look-out of Com-length, and found ourselves approaching the island modore Perry first discovered the British fleet, of Mackinac. This little island, situated off the under Captain Barclay; from "Put-in Bay" he northern point of the peninsula of Michigan, at sailed forth to his victory, and to it he returned to the junction of Lakes Huron and Michigan, rises bury his dead; and here are still to be seen the to a height of between three and four hundred feet remains of some of their graves. above the surface of the water. It presents abrupt sides, thickly clothed with vines and shrubbery, presenting here and there a naked white cliff projecting through the green moss. On the edge of one of these cliffs stands the fort, all its buildings and enclosures being snowy white. On the morning of our approach, a heavy fog had hung over the lake, but with the rising of the sun it disappeared, except where it hung around the mountain cliffs. The island of Mackinac was for a time completely enveloped from base to summit in a heavy cloud of this fog, while above this misty cloud, and apparently supported upon it, like a castle in the air, the white buildings of the fort gleamed in the sun's rays. It seemed almost a substantial representation of Cole's beautiful conception of the air-floating castle in his serial paintings of the voyage of life.

From "Put-in Bay," our next point of destination was Detroit. We entered the Detroit river through the channel on the British side of Bois Blanc island, or, as it is vulgarly called, " Boblow." Entering this river by this channel, with the British flag in view, the rather unpleasant idea presented itself of entering our own country through a foreign gateway.

As I presume is the case with most of my countrymen not living on the border, I have been accustomed to associate the British flag with the remote nationality of its seat of empire, and when seen flying on a shore separated only by a narrow river from our own territory, it seemed out of place, as though it ought not to be there. Although at the time conscious of the impropriety and injustice of such feelings, from the ready and involuntary manner in which they arose in my mind, I could imagine how strong might be the national feeling that the cross of St. George should not float so near the United States.

Detroit comes upon us at once like an elegant city. Its site makes a gentle rise from the river, which here flows rapid, bold, and clear. The densely built part of the city extends for a mile along the river, which is lined with docks, wharves, warehouses, vessels, and steamboats, whilst, back, numerous spires and steeples are seen rising from the dense mass of houses. From the Detroit river we enter the shoal lake of St. Clair, and, crossing this, stirring up the mud on its flats, we pass into the beautiful river St. Clair. The waters of this river, so clear that the bottom can be seen at the depth of thirty feet, flow through sloping banks, on which are farm-houses, villages, green fields, and dark forests. Where the St. Clair forms its junction with Lake Huron, it narrows very much, the opposite points of the mouth being not more than a quarter of a mile apart, and here the banks sink into a low gravelly beach, which, stretching away suddenly on either hand, leaves Huron, horizon-bound and ocean-like, before us. Its world of waters rush with a tremendous current into this narrow strait. It is a wild and lonely

From a distance, the white buildings of the town or village have rather a neat appearance. nestling on the narrow beach at the foot of the cliffs; but a nearer inspection shows them to be only a collection of small houses, shops, groggeries, and stores for the sale of Indian curiosities.

The time of our visit was near that at which the Indian payments are made, and the red men were gathering in for the occasion. Their conical huts, or wigwams, made of poles fastened together at the top, and covered with coarse rush mats, were scattered along the beach, and many of the Indians were paddling their large birch bark canoes about the bay. It may here not be out of place to say a word relative to an annoyance to which these poor creatures are exposed, and as they can be relieved from it without doing more than has to be done sooner or later, it is to be hoped some consideration will be had for them. They are called from their homes to this rendezvous for the purpose of receiving the very trifling sum allotted to each individual, and which really scarcely seems worth coming for, but so irregular is the time at which the appropriation is placed at the disposition of the department, that the Indians are sometimes kept waiting weeks before the money arrives, to an inconvenience and loss to themselves

Punc-through the black muddy soil, have nothing picturesque to charm the eye.

of more than the amount allotted them. tuality in the appropriation and payment of their annuities would save the Indians much loss.

The river originally opened into the lake some Mackinaw is nine miles in circumference, rising, distance to the southward of its present mouth, by abrupt terraces on the south side, to an oval table- winding along the beach, with a narrow sandspit land on the summit, and falling from this on the separating it from the lake. Piers have been north side gradually to the lake. On the south-erected cutting off this turn, and carrying the east edge of the table-land elevation are to be seen stream directly out into the lake. Just where the ruins of Fort Holmes, the British work which during the war of 1812 overlooked, commanded, and took ours, situated on the edge of the terrace below it. About the centre of the island a freak of nature is to be seen in the shape of a rock called the Sugar Loaf," but, naked and black, it springs up 80 or 100 feet more abruptly and needle-like than its name would indicate. On the lake shore is another curiosity, being a well-formed Gothic arch, of about one hundred feet elevation, springing over a chasm in the cliff: a narrow path crosses the arch, and is passed over by visitors at sufficient risk to invite the achievement.

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From Mackinaw we enter Lake Michigan, and running down its beautiful western shore, our next stopping place was at the town of Milwaukie. This is one of those flourishing western towns which have sprung suddenly from the wild forest into populous cities. Fourteen years ago it was laid out as a village, and now has a population of sixteen thousand inhabitants. It is built on both sides of the Milwaukie river, which here flows parallel to the lake, and separated from it by a table-land bank. Both banks of the river rise in gradual slopes, affording fine building sites, and the elevated plain between the river and the lake affords an extensive and commanding view. Milwaukie has a clean, light, and airy appearance, from the peculiar color and beauty of the bricks used in its buildings. Though burned, they are of a soft, rich cream color, and are of close and compact structure.

Leaving Milwaukie at eight o'clock in the morning, we continued our course down Lake Michigan, close to its shore, and passing several towns prettily situated on the bank--Racine, Southport, Little Fort-early in the afternoon we reached Chicago.

Chicago has been the theatre of the wildest excitement of speculation, in which, anticipation, intoxicated by the full stream of real prosperity, has indulged visions beyond the bounds of probability. Nevertheless, although individuals have suffered from their attempts to reap in the present the fruits of futurity, Chicago, by its rapid growth, almost fulfils the unbounded expectations of town-lot speculators.

Its prosperity arises from the fact that it is the only good harbor down in this southern extremity of Lake Michigan, and internal improvements have made it the depot of a widely extended and immensely fertile region.

these piers commence toward the town, stand, within an enclosure, the barracks and quarters of Fort Dearborn. This little fort, on the river bank, was in 1812 the only settlement, and was surrounded by wild Indians. After the surrender of General Hull the garrison left this fort, and soon after fell in with a large body of the savages. A conflict ensued, in which the whites defended themselves courageously, but finally surrendered upon condition that their lives should be spared. The condition was not observed, and a general massacre commenced. A Mrs. Heald saved her life by exclaiming to the savage who approached her with uplifted tomahawk, "You would not kill a squaw!" This was thirty-seven years ago. In 1823 a small village of ten or twelve houses and sixty or seventy inhabitants had grown up around the fort. Chicago has now a population of 20,000; the steeples of many churches overlook the widespreading prairie; handsome dwellings have converted the marsh into showy streets; blocks of brick houses border the avenues of business, along which bustles a busy crowd. For a mile, along the river, a continuous forest of masts indicates the extent of its commerce, and continuing further along this stream beyond the density of the city, piles of lumber from Green Bay have converted its banks into one vast lumber-yard, and in this neighborhood the puffing of various steam factories adds to the busy activity of the scene.

The enormous and splendid lake steamers daily enter and leave the river, crowded with passengers and enlivened by bands of music; and while we are looking at the moving palace with its multitudinous population, and listening to its music, we wonder at the skill and adroitness with which it is manoeuvred through the narrow stream, and amid the crowd of vessels. Although fortunes have been made in Chicago by the rise in real estate, labor has also had its just reward, for among the most showy and comfortable dwellings are those owned by mechanics.

The population of Chicago is made up, not only of immigrants from all parts of our own widespread country, but from all parts of EuropeEnglish, Irish, Dutch, Scotch, French, Swedes, Norwegians, &c. Notices, newspapers and political speeches are promulgated in the German as well as in the English language. To those who feel any apprehension from the character of the influence of these European invasions, consolation will be afforded by a visit to the public schools.

The handsome street and residences along the lake shore give Chicago quite a pleasant appear- Chicago is divided by its river and its branches ance when approached from the lake, but its site into three districts, and in each division a large, is not one calculated to win admiration. A low, commodious, and handsome brick building is erectflat, swampy prairie, and a sluggish stream wind-ed for the public schools. The foreign pupils

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