From the London Christian Spectator.

OLD TREES.

meet with in When I see

There are few things which I like better to my walks and wanderings than an old tree. one upon which the storms of some hundred winters have wasted themselves, sad and solemn feelings always come over me; I feel as if I could linger long about it; and sometimes, strange as it may appear, I could even prostrate myself before it, in mute and reverential awe. It is not that there is any thing very beautiful in an old tree-sometimes it is even the reverse; and when I pause to look at some broken trunk, with scarce a mark of verdure remaining on it, my friend who is with me will pull my arm, and wonder what I see in that to stare at. But to me, an old tree has always associations of a very interesting and pleasing character; and it is for these that I love to look at it, and feel a kind of friendship for it.

In the first place, the delightful idea of constancy associates itself with an old tree. Amidst the rush and push of this world's changes, there it has remained immovable for centuries; and whilst cities have crumbled away, and kingdoms have been revolutionized, and great empires have risen and fallen, it has "taken root downward, and borne fruit upward," and, year by year, its branches have spread themselves over head as a green canopy, and it has helped to make the face of nature lovelier and more beautiful. There is one tree in my neighborhood,-I think it is said that nine hundred years have rolled their clouds and played their lightnings over it,under which I remember gambolling when I was a child; and, though many changes have since come over me, and I have had my share of dark and sorrowful days; though friends whom I loved have left me, and some have turned coldly away from me, who I never thought would have done so; I go now occa sionally, and I find the tree unaltered:→→

"So was it when my life began;

So is it now I am a man"

the marks of age perhaps are more apparent, but it smiles upon me as it did of old; and in recalling, as I almost can,

the sweet and innocent thoughts and emotions which I indulged under it, and the remembrance of the dear departed ones with whom I stood at its feet, I can almost bring back the days so long gone, and fancy myself a boy again. And I am not the only one whom this old tree has cheered thus and encouraged: it smiled upon others before it smiled on me; and it will continue to smile when I am gone and departed. The traveller has many a time looked upon it, as he has passed the village in which it stands; and the broken-down soldier has recognised it with a tear, as he has returned after many battles abroad to the quiet home of his boyhood. For many a year the swallow, returning from her annual visit to a milder climate, has always found its branches ready for her as a resting-place; and in many a summer, the panting flocks have sought and found a grateful shade beneath its boughs. How many human beings and other creatures have cause to be grateful to an old tree!

But an old tree has always associated with it thoughts of the past. How many persons have gazed upon it who will never gaze upon it again; and with what different emotions has it been regarded at different times, and by different classes of character! The noble has gazed upon it as he dashed by in his chariot; and the poor lame beggar, as he hobbled past on his crutch. What tales it could tell, if it could but speak to us, of England in the olden time; and what revelations could it furnish of events but now imperfectly pictured forth to us in the pages of history! It has heard the old men talk of Alfred and of Canute, of the Conquest and William the Norman; the tales of the Plantagenets and the Lancasters have been told in its presence; it could speak to us of Magna Charta, and of the Crusades; of Harry the Eighth and the Reformation; it heard men talk with glistening eye of John Hampden and of Oliver Cromwell, and how they stood up gloriously against tyrants, and overthrew them; it listened to their deep murmurs at the tyranny of James, and to their shouts of delight at the accession of the Prince of Orange; and it has seen how the world, amidst its ups and downs, has been going forward all the while; and how, from all things being a monopoly of the few, the rights of the many have come gradually to be recognised, so that the "greatest

happiness of all" is likely yet to become the politics of the world.

There is one lesson more which we may all very properly learn from the contemplation of an old tree. Amidst all the changes which have occurred around it, and notwithstanding the storms which have beaten upon it, it has stood firm and unmoved. How calmly it has witnessed the joys and sorrows, the crimes and miseries, of the world! Oh, to be as patient as the old tree amidst the storms and battles of life; ever, amidst changes and uncertainties, fulfilling our high duty and destiny, with calm and conquering firmness!

I cannot bear to see an old tree cut down. When the woodman's axe approaches it, I feel a sympathetic shudder, and protest indignantly against the intended sacrilege. It seems as if I myself were about to be felled, and as if one of my dearest ties to this green earth were to be torn away. But perhaps it is better so. My friends of former years are all leaving me; and it is well for me to be reminded that I must soon follow them.

LOSSING'S PICTORIAL FIELD BOOK OF THE REVOLUTION. The Pictorial Field Book of the Revolution; or, Illustrations, By Pen and Pencil, of the History, Biography, Scenery, Relics, and Traditions of the War for Independence. By Benson J. Lossing. With Several Hundred Engravings on Wood, By Lossing and Barritt, chiefly from Original Sketches by the Author. In Two Volumes Royal 8vo. New York: Harper and Brothers. 1851 and 2.

This work which has been coming out in numbers for some time past, is now complete in two large handsome volumes; and in its present state does great honor to the industry and talent of its author, who, it seems, is equally expert with the pencil and the pen. It does great honor also to his patriotic spirit, which alone could have sustained him in so arduous and troublesome an undertaking. It is indeed a perfect cabinet of curious and interesting collections relating to our revolutionary contest, many of which have never been seen before, and which Mr. L. has been the first to gather and preserve by his care and skill. In short, we regard it as a highly valuable appendage to any history of the United States that has been or may be written; and we warmly commend it to all the public favor which we think it amply deserves.

Various Intelligence.

MINERAL WEALTH OF VIRGINIA.

Mr. John E. Penman, whose connection with North Carolina gold-mining we recently noticed, left with us a few days since, on a visit to his home in this place, a number of specimens of gold, copper, iron, lead and silver ores from the above named State and Eastern Virginia. Among them are galena, from Amherst co., Va., yielding seventy per cent. of lead, and another specimen from the same place, less rich in lead, but giving forty ounces of silver to the ton. This is more promising, to all appearance, than the gold veins of Charlotte. N. C., where $20 to the ton is considered a good return. These lead mines are within seven miles of the James River and Kanawha Canal. Mr. P. has also coal from the Dan River seams, very much like anthracite, but more easily ignited.

Every day brings new warnings to Virginia of the measureless mineral treasures she is leaving neglected in the bosom of her hills. It is safe to say that she surpasses every one of her sister States, not only in her wealth of the description estimated in mass, but in almost every particular form of it which any one of them can boast. Thus, of iron, the most common and generally distributed of all the metals, she has as much as Tennessee or Mississippi; in coal, she is at least equal to Pennsylvania; in salt, none can compare with her; in lead, she is probably not behind Illinois; in copper, she yields only to Michigan; in gypsum, she is far before all; and in manganese and similar products, valuable to chemists, she is inferior to none. A bold and healthy system of improvement would ere this have put in rapid process of development enough of these hidden possessions to make her the very first State in the Union. Winchester Virginian.

THE NEW CABINET.

WASHINTON, March 7.

The President to-day sent in the names of the members of his Cabinet, and they were confirmed by the Senate as follows: Secretary of State-Wm. L. Marcy, of New York. Secretary of Treasury-James Guthrie, of Kentucky.

Secretary of War-Jefferson Davis, of Mississippi. Secretary of Navy-James C. Dobbin, of North Carolina, Secretary of Interior-Robert MeClelland, of Michigan. Postmaster General-James Campbell, of Pennsylvania. Attorney General-Caleb Cushing, of Massachusetts.

THE MEDICAL COLLEGE.

The annual commencement at the Medical Department of Hampden Sydney College in this city, took place in the Chemical Hall of the College on Monday evening (14th ult.) The hall was filled to overflowing, and hundreds were unable to obtain admission. After music from the Armory Band, the Rev. B. Manly, Jr., opened the exercises of the evening with prayer. The names of the candidates for degrees, twenty-six in number, were then announced by the Dean of the Faculty, and the degrees of M. D. were then conferred by the President of the College, Rev. L. W. Green, D. D., upon the following gentle

men:

William Henry Abbott, Appomattox, Virginia. Thomas H. Barnes, Nansemond, Virginia. Blair Burwell, Jr., Powhatan. William M. Clarke, Warrenton, North Carolina. George H. Cooke, Richmond, Virginia. John Syng Dorsey Cullen, Richmoud, Virginia. Edward Carrington Drew, Henrico, Virginia. Alfred T. Goodloe, Franklin, Alabama. John R. Hendricks, Russell, Virginia. Thomas S. Hening, Chesterfield, Virginia. Robert R. S. Hough, Morgantown, Virginia. Wm. H. Hughart, Prince Edward, Virginia. Thomas E. James, Portsmouth, Virginia. Isham D. Jordan, Isle of Wight, Virginia. William Latane, Essex, Virginia. Horace M. Mackan, Middlesex, Virginia. Marion L. Mayo, Cumberland, Virginia. Theodorick P. Mayo, Richmond, Virginia. Samuel Meredith, Richmond, Virginia. Thomas M. Page, New Kent, Virginia. Edward Ransone, Gloucester, Virginia. Joseph A. Reynolds, Patrick, Virginia. J. Junius Roane, Charles City, Virginia. Edward J. Rowsee, Hanover, Virginia. Leroy C. Thrusher, Monroe, Virginia. Alexander C. W. Young, Portsmouth, Virginia.

The Gold Medal for the Prize Essay on the "Absorption of Medicines and the Mode of Action" was awarded to Edward Carrington Drew, of Henrico county, and was presented, with appropriate remarks, by Professor Maupin, who then delivered the Valedictory Address.

The exercises were concluded with the bendiction.

Dispatch.