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sweetness, then lapsing into discordant wailing and mourning like the imaginary cries of a lost soul. There came strains of demonial glee, and quicker and faster over the sheet iron fiddle went the brazen bow, and the dusky elbow of the player vibrated like a swiftly moving shadow.

In the center of the floor were the dancers. And what was Tom's astonishment as he glanced from the musician to the assembly, to recognize in the latter many familiar faces. There was old mother Sande, nearly double with age, dancing to the music as well as the best. There was that withered spinster, Aunt Polly, moving to the music and keeping time to the swiftest measures. But what astonished most our hero, was to see Betsey Haskins, the very girl he had left a half an hour before, in the midst of the crowd, handed to and fro in the dance, by a decidedly ill-looking old crone he had never before seen. "I don't wonder," thought Tom, " that Betsey said I must go, as she would not sit up after twelve o'clock. This is where she wanted to come."

All this, the scene and the following reflections, passed through his mind in a moment. The fear, which at first had overcome him, was dispelled and he determined to enter among the assembly. He was naturally a daring and reckless fellow, and, besides, the sight of Betsey made him resolve to find out the meaning of the gathering; and, as another reason, it was somewhat chilly outside, while there was a bright though rather blue fire burning within.

Accordingly he pushed open the door and entered, though with much the same feeling, as he had done years before, when he had been loitering along the way until he was tardy. No one, however, noticed his entrance. The music and dancing went on as before. He advanced to the fire and spread out his hands, but no genial warmth came from the blaze. He even passed his fingers through the lambent flame, but he felt no heat. As he drew them away he thought he heard a slight chuckle from the old fiddler, but when he looked at him his dark face was as impassive as ever. Tom was emboldened by this seeming indifference to his presence, and gazed with intense interest on the scene before him. As Beethoven, Tyrolea, and Cecilia, all combined, could not equal the music, so Terpsichore, Taglioni, Fanny Essler, or the veritable Jim Crow could not equal the dancing. As Tom stood there gazing, an irresistible desire to form in the dance came over him. So he shouted out,

"I say, old fellow, as your fire don't give any heat, won't you strike up some tune I know, and let me dance a little to keep warm."

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No sooner said than done. Without a moment's cessation, the music changed to "Money Musk," and Betsey Haskins took Tom by the hand and away they went. Tom never did any such dancing before. The music seemed to him to burn its way through every vein, and thrill every muscle with a new life; he executed unheard of steps, and performed feats of agility which would have brought down the house at any saltatory exhibition. There was no time to talk to his partner, no time to ask her if she was enjoying herself, or say any of those complimentary nothings for which Tom was famous among the sex. It was only dancing, and nothing else, which could be done to such music. Faster and faster went the music, and faster and faster the feet of the dancers. Finally just as the music was at its height, it suddenly ceased, and a gruff voice came from the desk,

"Now for a ride."

"Now for a ride," answered they all in an echoing chorus.

Betsey whispered to Tom,

"Don't you want a ride ?"

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Yes," answered he, "but I haven't any horse."

"Oh never mind that," she replied, "I'll find you one."

They were out of doors, and there stood as many as thirty coal-black steeds, all foaming and fretting to go. All were soon mounted but Tom and Betsey, and there was but one horse left, which she took for herself.

"Where's my horse?" asked Tom.

"Catch that calf yonder," she replied, pointing to a calf which was trying to keep warm by lying under the sheltered side of the school house. Tom caught it, and brought it to her. She muttered over it a few words, and it changed to a splendid black steed like the others.

"Now mount," said she, "and mind one thing! You are a little apt to profane. But if you say God or devil while you are riding, you will be sorry. Mark me, and beware!"

"Ready!" shouted the leader, and "Ready !" all replied.

Away they went at a rattling pace. Minding not for roads, they took a direct route toward the west. Fences, ditches, brooks, all were nothing. Over their horses went like the wind. Their speed began gradually to grow even more rapid, and vast strips of forest were over-leaped, while hills and villages seemed as if they were flying in the rushing air. But a few moments and Tom saw before him the wide Connecticut, seventeen miles from where he started.

"Are you going to leap that?" asked Tom of Betsey, who had kept close by his side.

"Certainly," she answered.

"I can't do it," exclaimed Tom.

"Pooh !" she replied, "follow me," and over she went like a bird. There was no help for it. He could not stop his steed, and was obliged to follow, and with a flying leap he found himself safe upon the other side. Astonished at the feat, Tom could not repress the habitual exclamation, which rose to his lips, and he muttered half aloud,

"What a Devil of a jump for a calf!"

No sooner was the fated word uttered than he found himself alone on the banks of the river, with a poor bleating calf by his side. He wandered about until morning, and then found himself in a village nearly twenty miles from his home. He hired a ferryman to take him across the river, and walked slowly home, pondering upon the strange vision. He determined to say nothing to anybody of what he had seen until he had visited Betsey once more and see if she confirmed his story.

Accordingly the next day he went up to call on Betsey. She was very glad to see him, as indeed she might be, since a handsomer or likelier young man was not in the country round. After the old folks had left them alone, they conversed awhile on indifferent subjects, until at last Tom said,

"That was a pretty good dance we had the other night, wasn't it, Betsey?"

"What do you mean?" she asked; "I havn't been to any dance with you."

"I mean night before last, in the old red school house. Don't you know I came in, asked you to dance. What's his name with an iron fiddle-ride on a calf which you made a horse-don't you know?" said Tom, mixing up his story in his agitation.

"Tom Jones," answered Betsey, "I begin to believe you're crazy." And she put up the corner of her apron to her eyes and began to cry.

"Don't cry, Betsey," said Tom, "I'll take it all back. All I know is, that I walked twenty miles home the next morning." And he told her the whole story.

Betsey pondered upon it awhile, and then said,

"I tell you what, Tom, it's a warning to you to leave off swearing. You know father has said that was the only thing he didn't like in you." And Thomas Jones never swore again. Though he always believed in his vision, and long after he had married Betsey Haskins, used to tell with infinite gusto the story of his jump across the Connecticut.

G. P.

Progress of Civilization, as affecting the Imagination.

THE human mind dwells more or less in the ideal. A thousand fancies, interwoven with realities, make up our daily lives. We are all dreamers, and to that extent, often, that our dreams become our realities; our realities, our dreams. To this ideal tendency of mind must be traced much of human happiness and excellence. All are moulded by its controlling power and pervading influence. The grossest plodder canrot bury himself so deeply in the toils and cares of the life actual, but that he may have some time and inclination to indulge in the hopes and aspirations of the life ideal. Every human mind, then, has its ideals of life, of truth, of Heaven, of God, more or less exalted, according to its capacities, and these ideals constitute the motive power, the stimulants to action, of that mind. In seasons of difficulty and despondency, they constitute its joy, its hopes, its life, its all. In seasons of gladness and bright promise, they increase the brightness of its hopes and urge it on to long-continued, more vigorous exertion. The scholar has his ideal standard of knowledge; the artist, that of beauty; the orator, that of eloquence; the Christian, that of faith. The reformer has his ideal governmental system; the statesman, his ideal state. For the realization of these ideals, each and all labor with small approximations, with continual progress. For this each and all toil, hope, and suffer. The advancement of society and of the individual man, constitutes then the end and aim of all our theorizing, of all our imaginative efforts. This same advancement is the aim, essence, and end of life. This too is civilization. To a certain extent then, when considered with reference to its results, Imagination is the cause, Civilization, the effect. One is required to produce the other; one cannot exist without the other; with the decline of the one we naturally expect the decline of the other. And shall we in view of this existing relation between Civilization and Imagination, believe, contrary to all analogy, that this great active principle of the human mind is weakened in the production of its legitimate effect? That the Imaginative faculty decays with the advancement of Civilization? That it is injured and paralyzed by the growth of its own offspring? No. It is far more rational, on the contrary, to believe that this motor to human action should exist unimpaired, with even the highest type of Civilization; that it should continually picture to man ideals more and more exalted, and continually urge him onward towards infinite perfection.

But the character of the influence which Civilization exerts over Imagination may be made more apparent by investigating the nature of the imaginative faculty itself. It is a complex faculty. The name is applied to a union of simple apprehension, conception, abstraction and taste. In strict language it cannot be called a creative faculty, for it is not the province of the human mind to create. All our imaginative efforts are but new combinations and new arrangements of old forms and familiar scenes, or they are new truths, drawn out, expressed, and rendered intelligible by means of these. These truths, however, are new only in the sense that the human mind hitherto has failed to detect them. They have remained buried in the bosom of nature for ages; they shine forth only as the touchstone is applied to them, when they bloom out in splendor like some centennial cactus plant, after a century of waiting. There are other truths of no less importance still resting there; weighty secrets, pregnant with good to men, but they will remain concealed till some brilliant imagination shall catch a glimpse of them in the future. Once in a while an original mind arises and perceives new relations among men; new, not because they had no previous existence there, but because the fact of their existence had been overlooked. All these new truths and relations we express and convey to others by means of what we have read, or heard, or seen. All efforts of the Imagination, then, depend, either directly or indirectly, for their brilliancy and power, upon the extent and character of our past knowledge. In such efforts we invariably "call upon the burial-places of memory to give up their dead." The more varied and comprehensive then our knowldge, the more abundant the materials for the imaginative faculty to work upon, and the more elevated their character, the more sublime will be the conceptions which the human mind is capable of forming.

In its progress, Civilization furnishes this knowledge, these materials, to the philosopher, the poet and the artist. In the youth of the nation, as in the youth of the individual, all its powers of mind are simple, unexpanded. It has no literature, no art, no science, no precedents of any kind. Like the mechanic without his tools, the earliest brilliant minds of a nation must, empty-handed, encounter the great unknown. They can receive no aid except from their own intellects, no encouragement to labor except their own ardent desire to discover truth, no sympathy but in their own great hearts. The most brilliant philosophical intellect in such an age can hope to make but small advances, during a lifetime, into the vast realm of mystery. But as the results of these labors

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