150 The Neglected Child-The Mind beyond the Grave. her down to die. The widow felt that the desire of the child would be gratified. She saw her little frame wasting away, and a bright and unnatural fire gathering in her eye, while her countenance sometimes wore an expression almost of beauty. Her young spirit seemed already disenthraled from every earthly passion and feeling, and glowed with an intensity of love, a stretch of intellect and a depth of thought that seemed almost supernatural. Her sufferings were so slight that she was able almost to the last to go about the house, and busy herself with her books and flowers. A few moments before her death, she laid herself upon the sofa, saying, mother, I am weary and will sleep.' The mother felt that it was her last sleep. She kissed her cheek. Ellen opened her eyes, and looked up; 'mother, you will be all alone when I am gone, but I shall be so happy, so you wont wish me back, dear mother. How very good our Father in Heaven is to let me go so soon.' She half raised her little arms, as if to embrace her mother; they fell back, the spirit of little Ellen had left the body. Mrs. G. felt that she was indeed a widowed and childless woman, but she scarcely wept. She lived many years like one who felt she was a stranger and a pilgrim' here, administering to the sick and relieving the wretched, and was at length buried by the side of her beloved husband and Ellen. THE NEGLECTED CHILD. BY THOMAS H. BAYLY, ESQ. I never was a favorite, My mother never smiled And yet I strove to please, with all P I learned to know thy worth; For even there I often felt Forsaken and forlorn; And wished-for others wished it too- VOL. I. But soon a time of triumph came,→→ A time of sorrow too,- Now wore the hue of death; And former friends shrank fearfully 'Twas then, unwearied, day and night I watched beside her bed, And fearlessly upon my breast I pillowed her poor head. THE MIND BEYOND THE GRAVE. BY MRS. SIGOURNEY. We cannot but feel that we are beings of a two-fold nature-that our journey to the tomb is short, and the existence beyond it immortal. Is there any attainment that we may reserve when we lay down the body? We know that of the gold that perisheth, we may take none with us when dust returneth to dust. Of the treasures which the mind accumulates may we carry aught with us to that bourne whence no traveler returns? We may have been delighted with the studies of Nature, and penetrated into those caverns where she perfects her chemistry in secret. Composing and decomposing-changing matter into nameless forms-pursuing the subtilest essences through the air, and resolving even that air into its original elements-what will be the gain when we pass from material to immaterial, and this great museum and laboratory, the time worn earth, shall dissolve in its own central fires? We may have become adepts in the physiology of man, scanning the mechanism of the eye, till light itself unfolded its invisible laws of the ear, till its most hidden reticulations confessed their mysterious agency with sound of the heart, till the citadel of life revealed its hermitage policy-but will these researches be available in a state of being which "eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived?" Will he who fathoms the water and computes its pressure and power, have need of his skill where there is no more sea?" Will the mathematician exercise the lore by which he measured the heavens-or the astronomer the science which discovered the stars, when called to go beyond their light? Those who have penetrated most deeply into the intellectual structure of man, lifted the curtain from the birth-place of thought, No. 10. Woman-The Star and the Lily. traced the springs of action to their fountain, and throwing the vain shrinking motive into the crucible, perceive the object of their study taking a new form, entering disembodied, an unknown state of existence, and receiving powers adapted to its laws and modes of in tercourse. We have no proof that the sciences, to which the years of labor have been devoted, will survive the tomb. But the impressions they have made-the dispositions they have nurtured-the good or evil they have helped to stamp upon the soul-will go with it into eternity. The adoring awe, the deep humility, inspired by the study of the planets and their laws-the love of truth which he cherished who pursued the science that demonstrates, will find a response among archangels. The praise that was learned amid the melodies of nature-or from the lyre of consecrated genius-may pour its perfected tones from a seraph's harp. The goodness taught in the whole frame of creation, by the flower lifting its honey-cup to the insect, and the leaf drawing its green curtain around the nursing chamber of the smallest bird-by the pure stream refreshing both the grass and the flocks that feed on it-the tree and the master of its fruits-the tender charity caught| from the happiness of the humblest creature, will be at home in His presence who hath pronounced himself the "God of Love." The studies, therefore, which we pursue is the means of intellectual delight, or the instruments of acquiring wealth and honor among men, are valuable at the close of life only as they have promoted those dispositions which constitute the bliss of an unending existence. Tested by its tendencies beyond the grave, religion, in its bearing and results, transcend all other sciences. The knowledge which it imparts, does not perish with the stroke which disunites the body from its etherial companion. Whilst its precepts lead to the highest improvement of this state of probation, the spirit is congenial with that ineffable reward to which we aspire. It is the preparation for immortality, which should be daily and hourly wrought out, amid all the mutations of time. WOMAN. Women are formed for attachment. Their gratitude is imperishable. Their love is an unceasing fountain of delight to the man who has once attained, and knows how to deserve it. But that keenness of sensibility, which, if well cultivated, would prove the source of your highest enjoyment, may grow to bitterness and wormwood, if you fail to attend to it, or abuse it. 151 THE STAR AND THE LILY. BY OLIVER W. HOLMES. The sun stooped down from his golden throne, The Rose is cooling his burning cheek, Now think thee, think thee, thou silly one, But what if the stormy clouds should come, Would he turn his eye from the distant sky, One ray from his far off throne, There is not a leaf in the mountain top, And warmed with his faithless beam,- That floats on the quiet stream? Alas for the Lily! she would not heed, But turned to the skies afar, And bared her breast to the trembling ray, That shot from the rising star; The clouds came over the darkened sky, And over the waters wide: She looked in vain through the beating rain, And sank in the stormy tide. I know no friends more faithful, more inseparable, than hard-heartedness and pride; humility and love, lies and impudence.Lavater. No. 10. Fiew in the Kremlin at Moscow. MOSCOW. 153 VIEW IN THE KREMLIN AT orders of architecture. Every part of it was Ifinished in the most beautiful manner, even to the fresco paintings on the ceilings of the room, and the coloring of the various marble columns intended to decorate the interior. It encloses a theatre and magnificent apartments. Had the work been completed, no The Kremlin is one of the divisions of the city of Moscow, which escaped the conflagration that in 1811, destroyed almost the whole of that city, and clouded the hopes and fortunes of Buonaparte. This escape is, doubt-edifice could ever have been compared with less, attributable to the fact of its having been built chiefly of stone, whereas the remainder of Moscow was principally composed of wooden houses. The Kremlin derives its name from the Russian word krem or krim, which signifies a fortress. It stood in the central and highest part of the city, is of a triangular form, and about two miles in circumference. It is surrounded by high walls of stone and brick, which were constructed by Peter Solarius, a Milanese, in the year 1491. It is not a little extraordinary, that the Tzars should have employed foreign architects at so early a period of their history as that in which the Kremlin was built, and when they were but little known to the rest of Europe. Such, however, was the case; and the consequence is, that this curious place wears a most anomalous appearance amongst the surrounding specimens of Rus sian taste and skill, of which it commands an extensive view. It contains the ancient palace of the Tzars, the arsenal, and several convents and churches; together with other buildings of various uses, and different degrees of magnificence. In the midst of the Kremlin is a deep pit. containing the great bell of Moscow, which is known to be the largest ever founded. The current account of its fall is fabulous: it lics in the same place in which it was cast, and never was, nor ever could have been suspended. Its circumference is sixty-seven feet four inches, its height twenty-one feet four inches and a half, its thickness in the part where it would have received the blow of the hammer twenty-three inches, and its weight has been computed to be 443,772 lbs. ; which, if valued at three shillings a pound, amounts to 66,5651. 16s. The great gun is another of the wonders of this place; it is about eighteen feet and a half long, ten inches thick, and of sufficiently large calibre to allow of a man sitting upright within it. Such are some of the curiosities of the Kremlim. it. It would have surpassed the Temple of Solomon, the Propylæum of Amasis, the Villa of Adrian, or the Forum of Trajan. "The architecture exhibited in different parts of the Kremlin, in its palaces and churches, is like nothing seen in Europe. The architects were generally Italians; but the style is Tartarian, Indian, Chinese, and Gothic: here a pagoda-there an arcade! In some parts richness, and even elegance in others barbarity and decay! Taken altogether, it is a jumble of magnificence and ruin. Old buildings repaired, and modern structures not completed; half open vaults and mouldering walls, amidst white-washed brick buildings, and towers, and churches, with glittering, gilded, or painted domes." The following extracts are from a long and interesting letter from Gen. TALLMADGE, of New York, President of the American Institute, dated August 18, 1836, from which it will be seen that the "great bell" has actually been raised. "The city of Moscow is a place of great interest, combining events of antiquity with those of modern times, and exhibiting many of the peculiarities of an Asiatic city. For the first time I there attended a Tartar church, and witnessed the ceremonies, and heard the language of the Mahommedan worship. The congregation was collected by a loud howling call of a person from a minaret of the church, and not by the ringing of any bell. The ladies of my party were not only permitted to remain with me as spectators, but the principal minister proffered us a seat upon the steps used to light the candles, while every other person in the house was either prostrate or seated cross legged on the open floor in the full observance of their devotion. Their habit and religion admit not of the presence of any of their own females, nor recognise them as accountable beings, to whom the door of salvation can be open. "There was," says Dr. E. D. Clarke, "a The Greek church is the established religion plan to unite the whole Kremlin, having a of Russia, and while it has many peculiaricircumference of two miles, into one mag-ties, it has many resemblances to the Catholic nificent palace. Its triangular form and the number of churches it contained, offered some difficulties, but the model was rendered complete. Its fronts are ornamented with ranges of beautiful pillars, according to different church. Their places of worship are more numerous than those of any other sect, and peculiar in having from three to ten steeples or domes on every church. Moscow is indeed remarkable for its numerous churches. 154 Old Letters-Crossing the Alleghanies. VOL. 1. of the still living, but the absent. Oh! what do they not afford of delight? They have the whole witchery of beauty, love and truth in them, without one speck or flaw to lower the tone of that enchantment they contain. Its profile view presents a forest of spires, || which the heart delights to expatiate; those domes and steeples. Many of them are literally filled with bells, but, unlike ours, and of various sizes and tones, they are suspended, immoveable, and the skilful bell-ringer, with cords to the various hammers, produces the ringing, and works out their delightful chimes. The size, tone, variety and perfection of the bells surpass expectation. The great bell of Moscow, so famed in history, and which has lain buried in the ground for more than one hundred years, has been recently dug out and raised. Its height and diameter is about twenty feet, and its weight is above two hundred tons. "The Kremlin yet stands the monument of ages: and those parts of the palaces of the Czars which have withstood the buffetting of time, and survived the wreck of wars, are there to bear witness of by-gone days. Moscow, like the Phoenix, has risen from her ashes, renovated and improved. Her wounds are healed, and her scars are scarcely visible. Her population has returned, and with an energy and enterprize, which promise improvement in her condition." OLD LETTERS. What a world of thoughts and feelings arise in perusing old letters! What lessons do we read in the silliest of them, and in others what beauty, what charms, what magical illusion wraps the senses in brief enchantment! But it is brief indeed. Absence, estrangement, death, the three great enemies of mortal ties, start up to break the spell. The letters of those who are dead, how wonderful. We seem to live and breathe in their society. The writers once, perhaps, lived with us in the communion of friendship, in the flames of passion, in the whirl of pleasure; in the same career, in short, of earthly joys, earthly follies, and earthly infirmities. We seem again to retrace these paths together; but are suddenly arrested by the knowledge that there is a vast gulf between us and them. The hands which traced those characters are mouldering in the tombs, eaten by_worms, or already turned to dust. Letters from those we once loved, who, perhaps are still living, but no longer living for us. It may be they grew tired of us; it may be we grew tired of them; or the separation may have arisen from mutual imperfections in character. Still the letters recall times and seasons when it was otherwise, and we look upon ourselves out of ourselves, as it were, with much melancholy interest. That identity of the person, and that estrangement of the spirit, who can paint it? There is still a third class of old letters on CROSSING THE ALLEGHANIES. The broad-the bright—the glorious West Is spread before me now, Where the grey mists of morning rest Is open to my view Land of the valiant and the free, I hail thee-valley of the west, I Here from this mountain height, I see Thine emerald fields outspread, Yet while I gaze upon thee now, Of untold hopes and fears: I look on thee with tears. O brightly-brightly-glow thy skies For eyes which in their radiance shine, Can these their light restore? That parts the east and west; Before me-lies a fairy land Behind a home of rest. Here hope her wild enchantment flings, Portrays all bright and lovely things, My footsteps to allureBut there, in mem'ry's light, I see All that was once most dear to meMy young heart's cynosure! VIOLA. |