And all the strength of Freedom's toil, From: Slavery's gates were flung, like dust. With servile souls this mill we fed, The mill grinds on! From Slavery's plain The mill grinds on! God lets it grind! DUGANNE. THE BLIND PREACHER. [The following extract is from Wirt's "British Spy." Rousseau, mentioned in the last paragraph was a celebrated Swiss philosopher. The reader will find this one of the most pathetic and beautiful pieces of a descriptive character in our language. It should be read colloquially, and in an animated manner.] One Sunday, as I traveled through the County of Orange, my eye was caught by a cluster of horses, tied near a ruinous, old, wooden house in the forest, not far from the road-side. Having fre quently seen such objects before, in traveling through these States, I had no difficulty in understanding that this was a place of religious worship. Devotion, alone, should have stopped me to join in the duties of the congregation; but 1 must confess, that curiosity to hear the preacher of such a wilderness, was not the least of my motives. On entering the house, I was struck with his preternatural appearance. He was a tall and very spare old man,-his head, which was covered with a white linen cap, his shrivelled hands, and his voice, were all shaken under the influence of a palsy, and a few moments convinced me that he was blind. The first emotions which touched my breast, were those of mingled pity and veneration. But ah! how soon were all my feelings changed! It was a day of the administration of the sacrament, and his subject, of course, was the passion of our Saviour. I had heard the subject handled a thousand times; I had thought it exhausted long ago. Little did I suppose, that in the wild woods of America, I was to meet with a man whose eloquence would give to this topic a new and nore sublime pathos than I had ever before witnessed. As he descended from the pulpit, to distribute the mystic symbols, there was a peculiar, a more than human solemnity in his air and manner, which made my blood run cold, and my whole frame to shiver. He then drew a picture of the sufferings of our Saviour-his trial before Pilate-his ascent up Calvary-his crucifixion--and his death. I knew the whole history; but never, until then, had I heard the circumstances so selected, so arranged, so colored! It was all new; and I seemed to have heard it for the first time in my life. His enunciation was so deliberate, that his voice trembled on every syl. lable; and every heart in the assembly trembled in unison. His peculiar phrases had that force of description, that the original scene appeared to be, at that moment, acting before our eyes. We saw the very faces of the Jews-the staring, frightful distortions of malice and rage. We saw the buffet,-my soul kindled with a flame of indignation, and my hands were involuntarily and convulsively clenched. But when he came to touch the patience, the forgiving meekness of our Saviour-when he drew to the life, his blessed eyes streaming in tears to heaven-his voice breathing to God a soft and gentle prayer of pardon on his enemies: - "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do,"-the voice of the preacher, which had all along faltered, grew fainter and fainter, until, his utterance being entirely obstructed by the force of his feelings, he raised his handkerchief to his eyes, and burst into a loud and irrepressible flood of grief. The effect was inconceivable. The whole house resounded with the mingled groans, sobs, and shrieks of the congregation. It was some time before the tumult subsided so far as to permit him to proceed. Indeed, judging by the usual, but fallacious standard of my own weakness, I began to be very uneasy for the situation of the preacher. For I could not conceive how he would be able to let his audier ve down from the height to which he had wound them, without impaiing the solemnity and dignity of his subject, or, perhaps, shocking them by the abruptness of the fall. But the descent was as beautifu and sublime, as the elevation had been rapid and enthusiastic. The first sentence with which he broke the awful silence, was a quotation from Rousseau: "Socrates died like a philosopher, but Jesus Christ like a God!!" Never before did I completely understand what Demosthenes meant by laying such stress on delivery. WILLIAM WIRT. THE THREE BELLS. [This poem refers to the well known rescue of the crew of an American vessel sinking in mid-ocean, by Captain Leighton, of the English ship, Three Bells. Unable to take them off in the night and the storm, he stayed by them until morning, shouting to them from time to time, through his trumpet, "Never fear, hold on; I'll stand by you."] Beneath the low-hung night cloud The good ship settled slowly, The cruel leak gained fast. Over the awful ocean Her signal guns pealed out; A voice came down the wild wind,-- Hour after hour crept slowly, And ship to ship made signals; And the Captain, from her taffrail "Take heart! hold on!" he shouted. All night across the waters The tossing lights shone clear; All night, from reeling taffrail, The Three Bells sent her cheer. And when the dreary watches Of storm and darkness passed, Just as the wreck lurched under, All souls were saved at last. Sail on, Three Bells, forever, Type of the love Eternal, As tossing through our darkness JOHN G. WHITTIER. THE SONG OF THE BROOK. I come from haunts of coot and hern: I make a sudden sally, And sparkle out among the fern, By thirty hills I hurry down, Till last by Philip's farm I flow I chatter over stony ways, With many a curve my banks I fret And many a fairy foreland set With willow-weed and mallow. I chatter, chatter, as I flow To join the brimming river; For men may come and men may go, I wind about, and in and out, And here and there a foamy flake |