the memory of his smile; or perhaps looks with fondness upon the pledges of his affection, as they stand like olive-branches round about his table. Twenty-two years since, the foregoing made a portion of one of the 'Ollapodiana' papers in the KNICKERBOCKER, by WILLIS GAYLORD CLARK. Glancing over his 'Literary Remains,' for the purpose of quoting his 'Victim of a Proof-Reader,' it struck us that we have now thousands of readers who doubtless have never seen it. Hence its reäppearance in these pages, where we hope it may prove acceptable. PRODUCTIONS of the African muse are, we think, too highly-colored to suit the general taste. PHILLIS WHEATLEY, once of Hartford, Connecticut, a sable poetess, wrote verses; but whether from their extreme floridity, or from some other cause, we cannot at this moment recall a single line of them. The following, which reaches us from a friendly correspondent in Jackson, (Michigan,) is authentic: "The facts from which the dark poetess drew her inspiration were these: Some time since, a colored convict was about to be liberated from our state-prison, and his master, from the South, was anxiously waiting for him outside the walls. The convict's time expired at twelve o'clock at night. He was liberated; but from the harmonious character of his complexion with the 'black and dark night,' he escaped. A sable poetess hereabout, to 'immortalize' the event, wrote the inclosed verses, printed copies of which were retailed in this city, at one dime a-piece. The 'Mr. LIVERMORE' referred to, was at the time prosecuting attorney, and the master had consulted him in regard to the re-taking of the 'cullor'd pusson.' Perhaps the subjoined, as a 'specimen-brick,' will suffice : And waited there till half-past-eight, 'We thank the people o're and o're, So free, so free, so free, so free: men. He took his blood-hounds by the back, This is a fine, easy, flowing style of verse for a colored poet-‘so free, so free, so free, so free!' A DESULTORY glance over the pages of the 'North American Review,' for the January quarter, assures us that it is an excellent one. Designing to speak of it hereafter, we shall only so far refer to it now, as to express our renewed convictions of the truths which it utters in relation to the popular London divine, the often eloquent SPURGEON. The subjoined so fully confirms, as our readers will perceive, our own expressed opinions, that we cannot resist the inclination to quote it. The passage concludes the review to which we have alluded: 'We have thus aimed to record our honest opinion, without prejudice, concerning this young man, who is attracting to himself, both in England and in our own country, so much attention. We have felt called upon to do this the more, from the indiscriminateness of the praise which has been bestowed upon his works. They have their excellences. The directness, simplicity, and fervor of the style, the richness and variety of the illustrations, the unfaltering vivacity, the frequent and often striking Scriptural quotations—these are qualities which are worthy of being imitated, and which we should rejoice to see more prominent in the American pulpit. But, unfortunately, the defects to which we have referred are more easily imitated, and are therefore more likely to be reproduced among us. It would require neither great talents nor much study to copy the intensity of language, the fearfulness of denunciation, and the freedom with the name of GOD which is used in these sermons. It is in these regards, therefore, that we have felt called to record our opinion.' A very just discrimination. a friendly correspondent from Columbia, (Tenn.,) 'taken from the Jackson (Tenn.) 'Madisonian,' (now, alas! no more,) nearly equal to that in a late number of the KNICKERBOCKER, taken from a Broome-county journal ?' Upon the whole, we do not know but we must answer in the affirmative: both, however, are excrutiatingly fine. Our present extract must be short: 'WHAT a glorious confederacy we live in, and how proud we should be of the essentials which make us the greatest people beneath the canopy of heaven's wide domain! Let us for one moment take a retrospective view of the past; the contaminated evils introduced by egotists, and the entire annihilation of the same by the PEOPLE in their power, it is an inducement to give every true lover of his country an enthusiastic impulse to yield to nothing that savors of inconsistency. The egotistical meanderings of monomaniacs in fusion-form, has caused the true admirers of the Union to enthusiastically rally around the mementoes bequeathed to them by their Fathers. We should be proud in our present enviable category, for having shaken off all allegiance to any thing the least tinctured with anarchy, deception and 'secresy:' we stand before the world and heaven as the beacon-light- a bright and gorgeous star, whose rays shed a benign influence over the whole universe. To the deep and poignant regret of all conservative devotees, the weaker sons of the Fathers have introduced a combination of non-essentials, concocted for the avowed purpose of deterring the Republican in the discharge of his imperative duty. A dynasty has been established, and men, disregarding the primitive injunctions instituted by the pioneers of Liberty, have run into inconsistencies the most horrible, setting at defiance the great teachings of a WASHINGTON, JEFFERSON, and other patriots who sought the perpetuity of the right, and the wrong condemned. We allude to those who have demolished within themselves the prime essentials which bind together the ingrediences that demands from every Freeman's hand, that legitimate protection so incumbent upon every man who venerates his or their ancestors, as the case may be. The wild and mysterious hyperbolical phantasm of enthusiasts would create a furor and stampede, run riot over the safe-guard of American liberty the constitution -stab to the very vitals the great incentives which clustered around the spot that gave birth to the mighty instrument, mock their primitive fathers and mothers, sing the requiem to the death-knell of Liberty, and gormandize over the destruction of the confederacy.' How sublimely comprehensive! A 'SUCKER' sends us the following account of an occurrence which took place at Snatchwine (Ill.) not long ago. A jackass, valued at four hundred dollars, belonging to a Mr. BACON, was discovered by the enginer to be on the track, only a short distance ahead of the train. All steam was put on to make the concussion as slight as possible: the jackass running straight ahead, instead of being crushed to pieces, was caught on the cow-catcher, and carried some distance before the engineer could slacken the train enough to allow him to creep forward and push him off. He rolled down an embankment some twenty feet, when a neighbor, observing what had happened, came over to see how things were: and strange to say, he found the jackass alive, raised him up, and drove him home, a half-mile distant. He was very stiff for about a week, and his chops were swelled so badly that he could not bray. Poor fellow! did n't he have an awful ride? The thing could not be done again in a thousand times trying. The rail-road agent came next day to pay for the animal, but found him alive and kicking,' but a 'sadder and a wiser' jackass. Aн, ha! our respected contemporary, Russell's Charleston Magazine, begins to have some 'experiences.' 'There are some special annoyances,' it admits, 'connected with the profession of a Magazine-Editor:' two or three of which are thus cited: AMONG such as affect the Magazine-Editor, we would mention the reception of voluminous unsolicited contributions of all degrees of stupidity, which he is not only expected carefully to read, but (if he be blind enough to reject them) duly to send back to their accomplished authors, by return mail of course paying the postage, which is sometimes enormous, out of his own purse! 'If he refuses, or is unable to do this, he is sure to receive, in the course of a week, any number of abusive letters, almost invariably ending with a pretty broad hint that he (the Editor) has mistaken his vocation, and that having failed to appreciate the profound essay of Mr. B., or the beautiful poem by Miss C., he had better vacate his post at once, and go to his proper business, which most likely is the raising of oxen and sheep, or the cultivation of roots of Baga! 'Another annoyance, and one not so endurable, results from mis-information as to the real ability of writers, who, having somehow gained a literary reputation, the Editor feels it incumbent upon him to secure, if possible, as regular collaborators. 'From one of this class an article is solicited, and in due time received. With the happy conviction that he is about to be instructed, interested, or vastly amused, the Editor complacently turns over the pages of the new essay, or treatise, or criticism, or biography, and is astonished to discover before he has proceeded a dozen pages, either that the performance is utterly worthless, and, therefore, inadmissible, or that in order to be brought to the condition of passing muster, it must be subjected to a process of pruning and weeding, whereby it shall be reduced to one-fourth of the original bulk! With much pain and labor the Editor accomplishes this very necessary task. At length the essay (or whatever it may be) assumes a presentable, perhaps even a creditable shape. It is printed and becomes popular, but in the midst of a score of favorable criticisms-criticisms which, had the article appeared as originally written, would have damned with faint praise, or dealt in the sting of well-merited ridicule; a communication from the incensed author is tossed, like a bomb-shell, into the editorial sanctum, which, the moment the seal is removed, bursts into an explosive volley of harsh epithets, bitter reproaches, and angry inuendos, to the effect that the Editor (possibly in a spirit of envy unparalleled in meanness) has stooped to deform and mutilate a paper which would otherwise have thrown his own literary pretensions wholly in the shade!' even now. Wait, brother-Editor, until you have had twenty-five years' 'experience, and then see what you will say. But you have hit the mark exactly, An esteemed correspondent, who does n't know we know him, and his, writes us from San-Francisco: 'I happened not long since to be a passenger in the stage which runs daily from San-Francisco to San-José. Just as we were leaving the suburbs of the city, the stage, already tolerably crowded, stopped to take in another passenger. This proved to be an Irish woman: her breath redolent with the second-hand perfumes of bad rum, and unfortunately for me, the only vacant place was next myself. After turning several times to look me in the face, and give me the full benefit of her morning potations, she asked: 'Are you the young man that came out in the same ship with JIMMY MAC DUFFIE?' Surprised by the question, and not quite sure that I understood the name, I requested her to repeat it. She did so, with the additional information that the ship stopped at Mazatlan. I replied that I was quite sure I had never met Mr. MAC DUFFIE. Whereupon she added: 'I thought if you was n't him, perhaps you might know where he was: he was sick, the last time we heard from him.' You can almost hear the brogue. Her reasoning reminds me of another question, actually asked me in West-Tennessee. A citizen of that benighted section of the country, (I speak of it as it was eight years ago,) hearing that I had lived in New-York, asked me if I was acquainted with 'BOB ADAMS!' I replied that I did not think I had ever met the ADAMS he referred to. 'Oh!' said he, 'you must have met him: he has been driving a wagon into the city every day this twenty years!' -- IN a very interesting biography of FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE, by Miss MARY Cowden Clarke, we are glad to find this paragraph: 'Inexpressibly delightful is the intimation that Miss NIGHTINGALE gives token of being 'gifted with a lively sense of the ridiculous.' Possessing the exquisite perception of the pathetic in existence which her whole career proclaims her to have, it would have been a defect in her nature, nay, a lack of the complete feeling for pathos itself, had she not betrayed a capacity for receiving humorous impressions. Humor and pathos are so nearly allied, in their source within the human heart, so mingled in those recesses whence spring human tears at the touch of sympathy, that scarcely any being deeply affected by mournful emotion, can remain insensible to the keen appeal that resides in a ludicrous idea.' 'I WISH,' writes a city correspondent, 'that you would quote that Victim of a Proof-Reader,' by OLLAPOD, to which you referred in your last, in introducing the 'Breakfast-Table Autocrat's 'emended' lines. I have never seen it. If you do not wish to publish the article, please state in what number of the KNICKERBOCKER I can find it.' It was published twenty-three years ago, and here is the essential portion of it: 'UNFORTUNATELY, typical mutations in published мss. have come down to the present day. Not many moons since, I was called upon by a small and humblelooking person, in green spectacles, behind which there rolled two enormous gray eyes. He said he was a man of many occupations, and sometimes dabbled in literature. He had thoughts of buying some western lands, if any one would credit him for six years, and in that way make his fortune. A friend in Texas had also assured him that he could get some lots there on the same terms. In these enterprises he wished me to join him. But first, and before showing me some poetry, which had been spoilt in the publication, he wished me to loan him a dollar, and accept his note to that amount, 'with sixty days to run.' A humorous thought struck me, and I chose the latter, with the direction that he should try it for discount at the United States' Bank. The next day I received a carefully-written 'business letter' from him, which (after promising to call on me in an hour after I received it) contained the ensuing: "December 17. "MY DEAR SIR: I have had an interview with Mr. BIDDLE, and truly lament my inability to communicate satisfactory results. I fear that until the resolution of the Senator from Ohio, in regard to the repeal of the Treasury order, is finally disposed of, the trading interests will materially suffer. "The Board of Directors, however, have some reason to indulge in the pleasing hope, that a small keg of ten-cent-pieces will arrive from Tinnicum, some time during the ensuing week; in which case, the president has promised to exert his influence in my behalf on the next discount-day. "If we should be successful in ultimately elevating the breeze (raising the wind) on my promissory note, we can proceed without delay to our contemplated acquisitions in Michilimackinac lands, and Texas scrip. Your obedient friend, "ZEBEDEE FUSSY.' 'He was with me, almost before I had read his letter. 'Ah!' said he,' reading You make pieces some my scroll, I see. Funny circumstance. But never mind. times for the KNICKERBOCKER, do n't you?—apt kind o' pieces, that come out of your head? I borrow that there periodical, sometimes, of a friend, and I seen a piece-t there about a man who was the 'Victim of a Proof-Reader.' I am one of that class. Two years ago I was in love. I was jilted. Hang details: the upshot is the main thing. Well, I had tried the young lady, and found her wanting; and I thought I would quote a line of Scripture onto her, as a motto for some bitter and reproachful verses.' So, holding a manuscript in one hand high up, and placing the other arm a-kimbo, he read as follows: 'Here he stopped, his gray eyes rolling in a wild frenzy, and drew a newspaper from his breeches pocket. 'Sir,' said he, striking an attitude, 'I sent them verses for to be printed into the 'Literary Steam-boat and General Western Alligator.' It is a paper, Sir, with immense circulation. A column in it, to be read by the boatmen and raftsmen of the west, is immortality. I say nothing. Just see how my effusion was butchered. I can't read it.' I took the paper, a little yellow sixby-eight folio, and read thus: "To Ore, Found Washing. 'MFCE, MERE, TREACLE, O'SARTAIN!'-SCULPTURE. "THOU hast no means, at once to slew Thy beasts, and girdless tongues to tree; |