repose. It is true we have enough to induce It is the priming of the soul, that, laying us us to it then. The day could not but present in the oil of grace, preserves us from the us with something either worthy our thanks, worm and weather. When the mind in the or that needed our begging and pardon, for morning opens to God, as the eye to the sun's removing or continuing something; and clear light, by the radiance of the divine though we be immured with walls and dark- beams, we become enlightened inwardly all ness, yet we are not exempted so from perils, the day. He is lifted in God's service and but that, without our God's assistance, we protection, that makes it his first work to be are left a prey to all that is at enmity with enrolled by prayer under the standard of the man. Besides, sleep is the image or shadow Almighty. It was from hence, sure, that deof death; when the shadow is so near, the votion sprung of Christians crossing themsubstance cannot be far remote. The dying selves at their entering upon business. All Gorgias being in a slumber, and asked by a thriving states have ever sought the gods in friend how he did, he answered, "Pretty their first infancy. The morning in the day, well; only sleep is recommending me up to is as youth to the life of a man. If that be his brother.' Some, we know, in health well seasoned, it is likely that his age may have gone to rest eternal; and without think- answer it, and be progressive in the path of ing of the other world, have taken their leave virtue. To live well every day is the greatof this, not knowing themselves that they est and most important business of man; and were on their way, till they had fully de- heing unable for it of himself alone, he needs spatched their journey. the more to gain divine assistance. In works of moment, even heathens never ventured without their seeking first such deities as they believed might help them.

But notwithstanding all this, a man at rest in his chamber, like a sheep impenned in the fold, is subject only to unusual events, and such as rarely happen; to the emissions of the more immediate and unavoidable hand of God. Danger seems shut out of doors; we are secured from the injury of the elements, and guarded with a fence of iron against the force of such as would invade. We are removed from the world's bustle and the crowd of occasions that jostle against us as we walk abroad. He that is barred up in his house, is in his garrison, with his guard about him, and not so soon attacked by his enemy as he that roves in the open and unsheltered field. Who knows not the ship to be safer in the bay or harbor, than tossed and beaten in the boiling ocean? Retiredness is more safe than business. We are withdrawn when the veil of night and rest inwraps us in their dark and silent cabinet.

But with the sun we do disclose and are discovered to our prying enemies. We go abroad to meet what at home does not look after us. He that walks through a fair of beasts, is in hazard to be gored or kicked, or bruised, or beaten. We pass through briars and thorns and nettles, that will prick and scratch and sting. We are in the day as travelling through a wilderness, where wild and savage creatures are, as well as tamer animals. All the world is Africa, where heat and drought, venom, or something new, does still disturb us. The air, the fire, the earth, and water, are apter all to wound us. The frays, the trains, the incitements, the opportunity, the occasions of offence, the lures and temptings from abroad, and the businesses and accidents of life, deny us any safety but what we have from the favor of protective Providence.

Besides, prayer does sacre all our actions.

"Nothing's well done

But what at first is with the gods begun."

He carries an assistant angel with him for his help, that begs his benediction from above; and without it he is lame and unarmed. We do not find that Saul's devotion ever was superlative; yet he was troubled for fear the Philistines should catch him before he said his prayers. (1 Sam. xiii. 12.) And because he had neglected this, he stumbled up an offering, thinking in that way to supply it.

LOVE.

The brightest part of love is its confidence. It is that perfect, that unhesitating reliance, that interchange of every idea and every feeling, that perfect community of the heart's secrets and the mind's thoughts, which binds two beings together more closely, more dearly than the dearest of human ties, more than the vow of passion, or the oath of the altar. It is that confidence which, did we not deny its sway, would give to earthly love a permanence that we find but very seldom in this world.

ORIGINAL.

ETERNITY.

The sun shall cease to shed his genial light,
And luna, too, refuse to gild the night,
And all the stars in yonder heaven dissolve;
The earth within her sphere no more revolve;
Yea, time with all its works, shall cease to be,
Yet man is destined for ETERNITY.
J. L.

I entered the walls, and soon saw enough 'I do not doubt it, madam, and I can only to disgust and sicken. The miserable inhope that those who are now blessed with mates who were able to keep out of their health and plenty may never be sick, and beds and to eat, were assembled in the refecstand in need of such sympathies, and that tory; and there a sanctimonious man, whethose who have a home may never be thrust ther chaplain or superintendent, or what not, into such a shelter.' with uplifted hands was imploring Heaven's As I shall never have occasion to recur to "blessings-shall I be believed when I state

the fact?-upon a dinner of BOILED HORSE FEET.* This species of shell-fish is used in maratime districts to enrich the soil, and vast quantities are brought out of the sea for that purpose, and are scattered over the fields, tainting the air for miles around. Swine are fattened on this fish, which renders the flesh so strong and disagreeable that it is scarce eatable. But it is only in the County Poor House that this noxious food is administered to men. The paupers started from the table in disorder when they beheld a stranger; and some of them coming towards me stretched out their hands for alms. Poor Timmy Timmons, who had known much better times, and had lived on a good farm all his life, but being a simpleton, had lost his all in times of speculation, came to me with his mouth full of horse feet and complaint. He had no peace by night or day. He couldn't get enough to eat, and his fellow pensioners kicked him, and bit him, and knocked the hat off his head. Joe Haywood, classically educated in England, and a drunkard and a vagabond by his own fault, stretched out his hand and said, Salve Domine !-give me sixpence to have my beard taken off.'

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Fie, fie, Joe! a gentleman commoner asking for alms?'

.

Countenances suffering and hellish passions had ploughed their deep furrows, had there laid down to die, with their filthy rags about them. What a foul and revolting spectacle was this, to behold human beings herded together like the beasts that perish; without care, without comfort, without hope! I cast my eyes around the room for an instant, and then, like him who looked into a dungeon and saw the poor prisoner computing his calendar, I felt the iron enter into my soul.' Here were a few who had seen better days,' and, among the rest, lying as far apart as possible from his companions in misery, in one corner, on a little straw, I found the poor boy. He did not notice my approach. A white film was over his eyes, which were only half closed. His countenance was much changed, and looked very death-like. I feared he was in the arms of death, and too far gone to be removed.

He opened his eyes gradually, looked wildly around, and then, seeing me, he rose suddenly up and a gleam of hope seemed to dart over his countenance.

'William,' said I, 'I have come to take you away.'

The gleam of hope brightened into a smile of inexpressible pleasure and gratitude.

Thank you!" said he, clasping his hands.

abode !'

'Are you strong enough to endure the journey, William? It is a long ride.'

'Oh! yes, yes! I shall be better. I shall die here. Do take me away! My parents would weep to know that I was here.'

'Very well,' said I; 'are you ready to go at once? I am come expressly to take you. I have an easy carriage, and we will accomplish the journey at our leisure.'

Phoebe Thompson, a miserable hag, like-Death! death!—any thing but this horrible wise wanted a sixpence to replenish her gin|| bottle; and these sort of requests were thickening, when the superintendent, who had said grace, started from his seat in a fury, and told the poor wretches to finish their 'meal of wittles;' and to stop their beggarly mouths. "The most of those who come here,' reasoned I, as I turned from the tables, 'pay the penalty of their own crimes, and therefore to feed them would be holding out an inducement to vice; but is that an apology for putting up the county paupers yearly, and selling them to the most reasonable bidder! Is that an apology for subjecting them to the avarice of contractors, and for importing large quantities of horse feet from the sea, and surfeiting them with dainties which the very swine reject?'

I passed into the room (there were only two rooms in the house) where I expected to find the patient on whose account 1 had come; but I recoiled instinctively the moment entered. It was small, black, begrimed with dirt, and the air insupportable. And there on their low pallets, which covered the floor in all directions crowded together and unable to stir by reason of loathsome diseases, black and white, male and female, lay the most wretched part of the county paupers! The palsied, the leprous, the paralytic, on whose * Otherwise known by the name of "King Crabs."

He rose at once, with more strength and energy than I thought him possessed of, and walked out of that horrible den. With a little assistance, he ascended the carriage. Timmy Timmons, whose misfortunes had destroyed his mind, came to me as I was about to depart.

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Doctor,' said he, with an idiotic smile, won't you take me too? Why didn't you come and take dinner with us? Ah! did you hear Toney say grace? Wasn't it a pretty grace?'

No sooner had we turned our backs upon the place, and commenced our journey home ward, than the young man buried his face in his hands, and wept. They were grateful tears, springing from a pure well spring, and with them a load of grief was removed from the heart, and hope revived; and the fresh breeze and the boundless fields, and the blue sky, spoke again of life, happiness and love.

A HOMESPUN YARN;

The "Experience" of the Blacksmith of the

Mountain Pass.

CHAPTER I.

With very few advantages of elementary education, he had, nevertheless, at different formation which he was very fond of disperiods, collected a mass of heterogeneous inplaying on occasions. He was a sort of political antiquary, and could tell the opinion of Mr. Jefferson or Mr. Madison, on any subject, At the entrance to one of those gorges or and was referred to on all disputed points of gaps in the great Apalachian chain of moun- the theory and history of the government, tains, in their passage across the northern that arose among the candidates for the legportion of Georgia, a blacksmith had erected islature, and country politicians. This he his forge, in the early settlement of that re-studied on account of the consequence it ingion by the American race, and drove a vested him with. But why he had treasured thrifty trade in the way of facing axes and up an old and well-thumbed copy of Paine's pointing ploughs for the settlers, and shoeing" Age of Reason," and affected skepticism as horses for wayfaring people in their transit through the country, to examine gold mines and land.

to the story of Jonah and the whale, and Baalam and the ass, would be hard accounting for, unless it proceeded from the desire of a character for singularity and erudition. When vanity once gets the mastery of a man's reason, there is no telling the absurdities it will lead him into. He was fond of speaking of Volney, and being found with a copy of Taylor's " Diegesis" in his hand, although few of his neighbors had heard of the author of the Ruins," or knew what Diegesis

meant.

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As he was no ordinary personage in the affairs of his neighborhood, and will make a conspicuous figure in this narrative, some account of his peculiarities will not be uninteresting. Having acted through life on a homely maxim of his own-" pay up as you go up," he had acquired some money and was out of debt, and consequently enjoyed "the glorious privilege of being independent," in a degree that is unknown to many who oc- This peculiarity, together with the perticupy a larger portion of this world's attention nacity of the missionaries, Worcester and than himself. He was a burly, well-looking Butler, which carried them to the penitenman, of thirty-five, just young enough to feel tiary, may account for the great aversion of that all his faculties, mental and physical, Mr. Edward Forgeron to all preachers of the had reached their greatest development, and Gospel. His dislike for them was so excesjust old enough to have amassed sufficient sive, that he could not speak of the "hypoexperience of men and things, to make the critical scoundrels," as he called them, withpast serve as a finger post to his future jour-out flying into a passion, and using indeconey through life. With a shrewd, but bold rous language. and honest look, there was a gleeful expression in the corner of his eyes, that spoke of fun. The "laughing devil in his eye" was not a malicious spirit, however. His physical conformation was that which combined strength with agility, and if he had been fated to have been a contemporary of his great prototype, Vulcan, there can be no doubt but the Lemnian blacksmith would have allotted to him a front forge in his establishment, to act as a pattern card, and to divert the public gaze from his own game leg to the fair proportions of his foreman.

But a circumstance occurred which gave his zeal a distinct and sectarian direction. A Methodist preacher over in Tennessee, who was fond of spicing his sermons with anecdotes, once made the blacksmith the principal character in a long sermon. His peculiarities were dilated on, and his heresies dealt with in becoming severity. He was ridiculed by the preacher. All this came to the ears of Forgeron, with such additions and embellishments as stories usually receive in passing to a third person. It would be as useless to describe a mountain storm, as to attempt to picture the wrath of this mountaineer. But if we cannot portray the storm, the consequences may be easily told. The blacksmith swore in his wrath that he would whip every Methodist preacher that passed the gap, in revenge of the insult.

Now, although Ned Forgeron, for such was the name he had inherited from some Gallic ancestor, was a good-natured man, yet the possession of great muscular strength and courage, and the admiration which a successful exercise of this power never fails to command, had somewhat spoiled him. Without Forgeron was a man of his word, as the meaning to injure any mortal, he had man- bruised features of many of John Wesley's aged, nevertheless, to try his prowess on sun-disciples could testify. His character soon dry of his neighbors, and from the success which always crowned his honest efforts in that way, had unconsciously acquired the character of a bully.

went abroad, and the good old matrons of the surrounding counties, on each side of the mountain, trembled at his name.

In short, the mountain pass, which was

when that permission was received, he was not slow to avail himself of the privilege.

really as romantic a place as a landscape painter would seek for a picture, and was just the spot to remind a youth fresh from his At the next annual conference, when circlassic studies, of the place where Leonidas cuits were assigned to the different preachand his three hundred Spartans fell, in at- ers, this one made his appearance punctually, tempting to defend Greece against the army but by some process of casuistry, convinced of Xerxes; in despite of the grandeur of its himself that duty did not call for a revelation of beetling cliffs, and the beauty of its verdure, his sufferings. Whether he was too sensitive it was associated, in the minds of many pious of the blacksmith's character to expose it to persons, with the broad gate that leads to de- || rude remark, or whether he had a preference struction. And Ned Forgeron, the handsome that some worthier brother should occupy that blacksmith, was invested with the attributes healthy station among the mountains, is diffiand aspect of his Satanic majesty, by many cult to conjecture. But Forgeron's reputation a mountain girl, who would doubtless have had extended beyond the circuit, and was done fallen in "love at first sight" with him, un- ample justice to by others, who had heard of der any other name. his fame. It soon became the subject of animated conversation, and there was no little wincing, each one fearing it would be his cruel fate to be sent a victim to appease the wrath of this human monster against the Methodist church.

The preacher, whose circuit lay on either side of the mountain, at the time Ned's direful edict was promulgated to the world, was a meek and lowly man, who approached nearly in his natural disposition to willing obedience to the mandate relative to turning the cheek to the smiter. The poor soul passed many sleepless nights in view of the fate that awaited him at the mountain pass. In his dreams he saw Forgeron with a huge sledge hammer in his hand, ready to dash out his brains, and would start with such violence as to wake himself. He inquired if there was no other place at which the mountain could be passed, only to learn his doom more certainly. Being a timid man, but withal devoutly impressed with a sense of duty, he resolved to discharge his duties faithfully, be the consequences what they might. Like a lamb going to the slaughter did he wend his way toward the gap; as he came in front of the shop, the blacksmith was singing, to the tune of Clear the kitchen,"

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"Old Georgia is a noble State,

Her laws are wise, her people great."

On catching a glimpse of the poor parson, who had flattered himself that he was about to pass with impunity, Ned sung out

66

Stop there, you eternal plain-coat, and pay the penalty of my injured reputation."

The holy man protested innocence of having ever intentionally injured him, by word or deed.

After a time it was decreed that the Rev.

Mr. Stubbleworth was the doomed individual, and when the annunciation came, many an eye of mingled pity and curiosity was turned on his ruddy good-natured face, to see how the dispensation was borre, but not a muscle moved. With a quiet smile, he professed a perfect willingness to go where he was sent. He was "clay in the hands of the potter," he said. Whether he piqued himself on a stolid indifference to the blacksmith's pummelings, or whether he relied on his ample dimensions to protect himself, he never disclosed, but appeared as self-satisfied and content as ever. His predecessor looked for all the world like a mouse just escaped from the fangs of some terrible grimalkin.

Mr. Stubbleworth arranged his few sublunary affairs, and bidding his friends adieu, mounted his old roan and departed for his new home of trials, with a song of praise on his lips. Let us hope the best for him.

CHAPTER II.

The Rev. Mr. Stubbleworth was very much pleased with his new situation. Having been transformed from a level pine woods country, near the confines of Florida, the novelty The man's subdued looks and earnest voice of a mountain scenery and a pure bracing athad half dissuaded Ned from his stern pur-mosphere seemed to inspire him with rew pose, when the giggling of his striker, and the cheering of two or three idlers, nerved him to do what he felt was mean. Let any one pause a moment, and reflect if he has never been urged on to acts his conscience smote him for, by the opinion of others, before Mr. Forgeron is sentenced as a devil. The preacher received several boxes on his ears, and heard many denunciations against his sect before he was allowed to depart; and

life. Complimenting all the mothers on the singular beauty and intelligence of their children, with a delicate allusion to their own personal appearance, he soon became a general favorite. Mr. Stubbleworth "knew which side of his bread the butter was on."

The time arriving for his departure to visit the tramontane portion of his pastoral care, he was warned of the dangers he was about to encounter, but they were heard with the