self-confident to crush its foreign foes. The summer passed away, and still the Venitian fleet remained absent, redressing wrongs, and inflicting vengeance wherever due-but as the winter approached, some wily overtures on the part of the emperor, caused a cessation of hostilities, and the Doge, hoping for a final settlement of difficulties in the spring, retired with his armament to quarters at Scio.

But there, an enemy more relentless than the word, assailed them, for the plague broke out the island, and hundreds in a day perished by the fearful scourge. Sufferings such as only have aparallel in the history of the modern Crimean war, ensued the Venitians were swept away Eke locusts before a northern blast, for the disease reveled with dreadful virulence in their quarters, numbering the noble Justiniani among its victims.

Father and son, kinsman and followers-all, all of that patriotic band, whose hearts were knit together by one common love, sank beneath the pestilence. The old man with his gray hairs, crowned with wisdom and honor, and the youthful son, glorious in the beauty and vigor of his opening manhood, slept together in death far from the tender hearts that loved them, and the gentle hands that would have closed with weeping love their dying eyes. The last thought of the ardent and affectionate Angelo was with his brother, and while yet his mind retained its consciousness, he dictated a few lines expressive of his dying wish and love.

"When you read these words, my Ziani, the heart of your dying Angelo will have ceased to throb with life-but its latest pulse beats for you and for our country; and I entreat, nay, I command you in the name of your departed father, never to let the name of Justiniani perish from its annals. All of our fated house, save you alone, my brother, will soon sleep in the tainted soil of Scio; but it is for Venice that we perish, and as the last of your illustrious race, it beats you, my brother, to forsake the shelter of the cloister, to call upon the church for a dissolution of your vows, and return to the palace of your ancestors, to cherish the age of our bereaved and sorrowing mother.

"Come forth, my brother, at the call of your dying Angelo, and let the love of the blighted Isaura console you for the afflictions of the past. Enter with her, who was the early chosen of your heart, into the holiest bond of earth, and through the long line of your posterity, let the illustrious name of Justiniani descend with honor to glow upon the latest page of our republic's history.

Farewell, my Ziani! my breath labors, and shadows gather before my fading sight-but, blessed be God, there is a world where we shall meet again. In this hope I am even in death, your loving ANGELO."

So perished the noble and patriotic Justiniani, whose resemblance to the Fabii was destined to be complete. "For," says a late historian, "like them, they had given all to their country, and all had perished for her; as with them too, a single root was found for their revival. With the Fabii, it was a boy too green for arms, who had remained in Rome-a forgotten monk, drawn from the shade of a cloister, and released from his vow of celibacy, preserved to Venice a name which was again to give lustre to her annals."

Sadly, when the spring opened, returned the miserable remnant of that gallant armament to the stricken Queen of the Adriatic. The voice of mourning was heard in all her dwellings, for in every home were missing the glad smiles of loved ones, who slept with the dead at Scio. Soon, too, the terrible pestilence swept its dark wings over the devoted city, and the lovely and beloved withered beneath its baleful shadow. They who had come back drooping and disheartened, from the graves of their comrades, had brought with them the seeds of the frightful disease, and sown them in the bosom of their homes.

The trappings of death saddened the gay and festive city, and the music of the guitar and the song of the gondolier gave place to the sound of bitter woe and lamentation; silent and dark stood her marble palaces, but nowhere reigned such utter desolation as within the lordly halls of the Justiniani. They who had once diffused through them the sunlight of happiness, and who were as nerves and sinews to the state, now mouldered in their distant graves, while in a darkened apartment of her once joyous home, lay the stricken wife and mother of that princely house, rapidly drawing near to the last mysterious change which is the doom of frail mortality.

An aged servant moved stealthily about the chamber, sprinkling scented waters over the rich carpet, and fumigating the air with burning pastiles, which emitted a pungent odor, while beside the bed knelt a young girl, who gently waved a fan of peacock's feathers above the pallid face of the dying. A profound silence reigned in the room, interrupted at intervals by the labored respiration of the sufferer, over whose sunken features a fearful change was gradually stealing. The young and patient watcher knew what it portended, but unused to

the aspect of death, she could with difficulty | dying matron, as his arms enfolded her, and she repress the sobs that struggled for escape.

The touch of a cold hand that feebly sought to clasp hers, aroused her, and looking up, she saw the deathly face of the lady turned toward her. Even in that moment the pale lips wore a loving smile as they parted to address her.

"God bless you, my child-my sweet Isaurabless you, for the love you have shown to the deserted and bereaved, in her hour of sorrow and of death. May He preserve you from the pestilence which walks at noonday through the dwellings of our fated city-but I fear for you who linger here to give me comfort. Remain not when I am gone."

"Dear lady, God can guard me here as well as elsewhere, or should he smite me now, it will but shorten by a few brief years, a life that has but little left to make it sweet."

The lady groaned.

"Dear child, I know full well its flowers are

lay motionless within their fond embrace.

"My mother, bless me! live for me!" said Ziani, inexpressibly affected.

God ordains it otherwise, my son-but for one instant, you have arrested my spirit's flightfor one instant only, while I bestow on you my latest blessing and command."

"I wait to receive them-and when she who gave me life, has departed, my sweetest consolation will be in fulfilling her last wishes."

"My son, with this ring I received the name and plighted faith of your noble father-if then his memory be dear to you, place this circlet on the finger of one worthy to bear that honored name to posterity."

"Cheerfully I obey you-my vows are annulled, and on her who will sustain untarnished the name to which the virtues of my mother have added lustre, I bestow this token of my lasting love and faith."

withered. Would my Angelo had been spared to As he spoke, he gently laid his mother from cheer it with his love. But yet, I murmur not-his arms, and turning to Isaura, placed the sacred God's holy will be done with me and mine."

A thrill of agony shook the delicate frame of Isaura, and she drooped her face upon her hands to hide the gushing tears. A deep groan from the dying lady drew her attention, and springing up, she bent over her in speechless anguish. The features were settling into the rigidity of death; but as Isaura's warm tears fell upon her clammy brow, she looked up and said with a faint smile

"I am passing away, my daughter, to the land which death never enters-they are there-and soon I shall see them again."

She spoke with effort, and Isaura's grief prevented her from replying. The lady regarded her with compassion, and striving to clasp her hand

pledge of an inviolable union on her finger, and as he marked it glisten there, he pressed her fondly to his heart, and imprinted on her bashful lips the first warm kiss of plighted love. To Isaura, suffering as she had, and worn and weary as she now was by her lorg and constant vigils beside the bed of illness, it was a moment of overpowering emotion, and she fainted on the breast that through every change had loved her faithfully and well.

Ziani bore his precious burden tenderly from the apartment, and consigning her to the care of an attendant, returned to his mother. She moved not at his approach—still and wan she lay upon the pillow, her white lips parted with smile of triumph, that proclaimed the spirit's victory over death-it had ceased to struggle with the woes of earth, and winged its blissful flight to a world of rest and joy; and Ziani, the last of the Justiniani, stood alone with the dead, and bathing the clay-cold face with tears and kisses, and yielding up his soul to the deep luxury of grief.

"Be comforted, my child," she said, "for truly you have been such, and more to me, and may God give to your dying bed the peace you have shed around mine." She paused, and with a brightening eye, looked around the chamber, as though searching for some object hidden in its obscurity. Presently she feebly said-"He is not here! Why comes he not to close my dying eyes? he who on earth is all that I may now call my own! But give him this, my daughter," and she drew a ring from her finger, "it is my mar-afflicted city of her birth. Ziani often sought riage ring and say to him-"

At that moment a light step crossed the chamber—a shadow fell upon the bed, and Ziani stood

beside his mother.

"Thank God! it is my son!" exclaimed the

In the quiet sanctuary of Santa Maria, Isaurs awaited the period when health and peace should again shed their benign influences over the

her there, and every interview riveted still closer the ties that bound their hearts together. But when the cool, calm months of autumn approached, the ravages of the pestilence were stayed, and then at the altar of the church, within whose

A PEAN FOR INDEPENDENCE.

BY PARK BENJAMIN.

UP THE ULLUM.

BY PERCIVAL SPUNYARN.

"Another shark!" said Carey; "d'ye see him in sheets-a black pall hangs over everything, coming down to windward ?"

"One, two, three; only three; another poor fellow gone!" "Give way, my bonnies! Hurrah! all together!—that's your sort." We were now close to them! the two men clung to the boat; one man still remained in the water; he flagged, he lifted up his hands imploringly, and his faint cry for help was drowned in the surging of the

waves.

which is ever and anon rent asunder by forked lightning. All this is very beautiful to contemplate, under cover, with a pipe and a strong tumbler of "grog." To have been caught up the Ullum without shelter would not have been pleasant; but here, snugly ensconced in the cabin of a good ship, I was fascinated; I sat up till the storm abated, smoked two or three pipes, and then retired to my cot to be lulled to sleep

"Way enough-in bows-back water!" said by the distant thunder. the coxswain.

Carey had divested himself of his jacket and shoes and plunged in after him; he dived; he rose; he supported the drowning man, three strokes and we were alongside of them, we hauled them in board-just then a huge shark dashed past us. "Thank God, you're safe!" said I, squeezing my friend's hand.

The two men who were taken off the boat had sustained no other damage than a good ducking; we learned from them that the first man who went down was the captain, and as he was striking out strongly, only a few seconds before he suak, in all probability both he and the other man were seized by sharks, for neither of them ever rose again.

It was a melancholy termination to our first attempt to go up the Ullum, and I felt the matter painfully at the time, as I understood both men had wives, and the captain a family to ament their loss. Of course, after such an occurrence, it was out of the question to attempt the passage of the bar, and we therefore made the best of our way back to the ship. I cannot avoid relating an incident connected with this sad affair which is strongly characteristic of the superstition of sailors. The boat in which this melancholy accident occurred was strong and well built, worth at least one hundred dollars; yet after we had taken the men off, there was not a man in the fleet would touch her, and she drifted sway to sea; I must say she had a bad character, as she had capsized at the same place on a former voyage and a man had been drowned.

The morning broke with a cloudless sky; the air was pure and refreshing; we took a hasty breakfast and jumped into our boat. The surf on the bar had subsided, and we entered the river without any trouble. I had heard that the scenery was picturesque, but was not prepared for anything so enchanting, and I could not help remarking to Carey how very inadequate language would be to convey a notion of the variety and beauty of the scenery. For some distance the margin of the stream was fringed with trees and shrubs; in the middle was a small island; this, too, was covered with tall cocoa-nut trees and bushes; and from which issued a cloud of parrots, macaws, and other birds of the most gorgeous plumage, that flew round and round uttering the most discordant sounds: monkeys, too, chased each other from branch to branch, chattering and looking wondrous wise, and when I pointed my gun at them it was evident they understood the nature of that weapon, as they all scuttled away like mad, except one old fellow who knowingly dodged behind a large leaf, and no doubt thought himself perfectly safe. The island extended for some distance, and the trees overhung, and formed a leafy canopy; a gentle breeze came laden with the fragrance of aromatic trees and plants; humming birds floated lightly across our paths, while a stream of water, clear and transparent, came tumbling from a neighboring rock.

Passing the island, the scenery became more striking and bold, and of an entirely different character. On our right, the bank rose with a gentle slope covered with fine grass, while in the distance the high land presented a succession of

a spacious verdant amphitheatre. The river was wider and dotted with numerous small rocks, covered with stunted bushes To the left the bank rose abruptly, and a thick forest extended far beyond the human vision.

When we got on board, the appearance of the sky threatened one of those thunder-storms which at this season are common in these lati-thickly wooded terraces, having the appearance or tades; we, therefore, made all snug for the night. A storm in the tropics is very grand, almost verging on the sublime; particularly in the neighborhood of high mountains. The lurid lightning plays among their tops; the thunder rumbling and then bursting with a terrific crash It is at such a time, with the grand diorama against their sides, seems hurled back again of Nature passing before you, and the distant with double violence; rain falling in torrents-mountains frowning on you, that you feel how