Page images
PDF
EPUB

I have hardly left myself room to say any thing about Mr. Crawford's execution in marble; his skill in using the mechanical resources of the art. But you will readily conceive that one capable of treading with so sure a step in the higher walks of sculpture, must have already familiarized his hand with its practical details. One of the most beautiful pieces of marble work done in Rome last season, and by the confession of artists themselves, was his bust of Mr. Ingraham, an English gentleman, well known for his taste in the arts. Should you go to Washington, you will see a proof of my assertion, in a medallion of Botta, presented, either to the president or to the library, by Mr. Butler, of New-York.

I had intended to give you an account of several other compositions of Mr. Crawford, which he has made, in the hope that the liberality of his countrymen, or of his country, may some day enable him to complete them. But it is time to bring this long letter to a close. I have indulged the more freely in these details, from their reviving, as it were, the hours we passed together within these holy walls, and calling up, with all the freshness of youthful hope, the fond anticipations in which we loved to indulge. I know that you will feel as I do, and that this picture of a young countryman, content to endure so much, in order that he might lay his foundation deep, by close and unwearied study; strong enough to resist the tempations so natural to us Americans, of rushing upon the stage before we are prepared to carry our parts through; I know, I say, that such a picture will awaken the same feelings in your mind that it has done in mine. Mr. Crawford has given six years to laborious preparations. He is now entering upon his career, with high hopes and a firm will. It is but just that he should be met on the threshold by his own countrymen. It is on their assistance that he must rely. It is to their applause that he must look, as his richest reward for the past, and the strongest excitement for the future. Let this letter give him his place, at least in your feelings, and lead you to look upon him with the same respect and affection as I do.

Believe me, my dear LONGFELLOW, ever yours,

U. S. CONSULATE :
Rome, Oct. 1, 1839.

GEORGE W. GREENE.

SONG.

SOUNDS SO Sweetly never as when evening twilight falls,
Thy voice, that back unto my heart what it has lost recalls;
When shadows people all the room, thy gentle hand in mine,
I list, as in a dream the while, those low, soft tones of thine.

Then comes the silent Past, from the tomb of buried years,
Bearing a lachrymary, filled with rose-leaves steep'd in tears;
And holding forth a magic glass, in which I dimly see
All that she keeps of mine that's most endeared to memory.

Familiar forms of dear ones gone, are then to me restored,
And visions of departed hours, well loved, but not deplored;
No, not deplored my vanished joys, nor yet recall'd with pain,
I would not give their mem'ry up, to live them o'er again!

O, ever dearest! wake for me, at quiet eventide,
Old songs of ruth I loved before I won thee for my bride;
But sing no mirthful ditties then, at best but little worth,
For tears than smiles are dearer, when music calls them forth.

J. A.

[blocks in formation]

How bright the change, when bursting from the doom
That held the earth in deep Cimmerian gloom,
That made the clouds but homes of ceaseless storms,
Where e'en no lightnings paled their lurid forms,
And caused the waters that were formed to glow,
To heave their darkened breast with sullen throe,
That light, swift messenger, from heaven came down,
With snow-white garments and prismatic crown:
When lo! from cloud to cloud leap living hues;
The waters beam, from seas to pearly dews;
A thousand varied tints unknown before,
New splendors on each object richly pour;
Mingling, reflecting, bright in every change,
Till all is glowing in their boundless range;
Till waves mount sparkling to the shining stars,
And mountains beam like heaven's aerial spars!

As light thus sheds its hallowed influence,
And magic beauty, o'er the realms of sense,
So mind, bright effluence from th' Eternal Cause,
Moved by AssOCIATION's plastic laws,
Impelled on restless wings of living thought,
By love inspired, with feeling deeply fraught,
Descends from heaven to animate the clay,
And fit man's form to face the god of day;
And as it swells with conscious power within,
An empire too without goes forth to win;
Becomes a part of the bright things it seeks;
Softens mid valleys, glows on mountain peaks;
Quails o'er the abyss where cataracts pour their floods,
And sinks with awe within the solemn woods;
Floats with the fleecy cloud o'er tranquil skies,
Loving, like them, the earth, yet fain to rise;
Delights o'er lovely present scenes to cast,
The distant, soft enchantment of the past;
Finds a mute language in each object round,
That stirs the bosom though it yield no sound;
Reads histories in the empire-bounding streams,
Or from their banks floats down the tide of dreams;
And hallows many a consecrated spot

With fond associations, ne'er forgot;

Loves to repose where, by his favorite stream,

With course as steady, with as mild a gleam,

The soul of WASHINGTON, his duty done,

Passed from the earth to triumph nobly won;
And burns with ardor on the humble green,
Where first the stain of freemen's blood was seen,
And cries, exulting, as its views embrace
The approaching glory of the human race,
'Here deeds of yeoman chivalry were done;'
Here bled the free; this, this is Lexington!

When once the soul admits this gentle power,
Its magic energy grows hour by hour;
It binds all nature in one chain of love,

And makes each link by one strong impulse move.
The mute insentient objects of the sense,
When touched by this exalting influence,
Moved by warm sympathies that closely bind,
Seem things like us of feeling and of mind.
Their graceful forms attract the admiring eye,
With hues and shapes replete with harmony;

But soon a power beyond mere beauty grows,
And with new life through every feature glows.
Thus the lithe willows by our native stream,
Whose silver leaves in its bright waters gleam,
Grow to the fancy, till their mournful sweep,
Recalled where'er we wander, makes us weep.
So the rude song that echoes on the hills
Of Switzerland and all her valleys fills,
If haply heard by wandering mountaineer,
In Po's rich vale, or Afric's deserts drear,
Recalls his native mountains to his thought,
Shrouded in mists, with fearful tempests fraught;
Recalls his cot that like an eyry clings,

Where the wild stream from melting glacier springs,
And up the snow-capped mountains to the sky,
Curls its white smoke as if with them to vie :
Ay, and far dearer are the rocks that scowl,
And wintry blasts, that round their summits howl,
Than the mild zephyrs of the Italian grove,
Wafted o'er flowery plains, on wings of love;
And, were he free to choose, he'd fly with joy
Back to the scenes that all his thoughts employ;
Where his loved mountains in rude grandeur stand,
His soul's high teachers, guardians of his land,
And bless the tempests that his home restore,
And love it for its whirlwind storms the more!

S. D. B.

AN ADVERTISEMENT.

I CONSIDER it a bounden duty, through this widely-extending medium, to advértise to the world that there are now floating over its happy surface two Individuals, of that bright order of Being called Woman, whose employment it seems to be to occupy alternately the hearts of their associates and acquaintance.

One of the two is endowed with a spiritual and fervent imagination, of surpassing richness and exquisite variety of thought, and seems limited only in a single train of moral investigation and discovery; that, namely, which leads to an understanding and appreciation of her own rare gifts.

The other, more balanced in her gracious faculties, acts out more calmly perhaps, if I could bring myself to employ such a term, I should say more perfectly - her own beautiful conceptions of goodness; and with an exacter justice, forms an estimate as well of herself as of surrounding objects. So also is the latter more defined than the former in that precision of outline which marks the space she fills in the imagination of the contemplator; and while the first is, as it were, the rainbow, whose arc is regular, but whose breadth and depth of celestial color no human eye can measure or fathom, the latter is like the planet, whose radiations of light are determined by fixed laws, both in their direction and extent.

I suppose it difficult to fancy, as connected with this life, two Intelligences of greater purity and sweetness; the one in thought and conduct, and the other in conduct and thought. I long very much to call the one my Inspiration; and the other my Development; so precious are the ideas which the one induces, and the other personates; and such is the affinity between the two, that after having been in the

.no,

society of the one, I desire excessively to behold the other; from whose presence I would again return to the former, as to a fountain of waters in the leafy shades of deep retirement. The world, and thou too, perhaps, admired chronicler, might, under this description, greatly wonder that I should wish to advértise and disseminate the knowledge of these two Existences. The world, and thou too not thou, but the world — might opine that it were the discreeter, and therefore the better part, to keep unto my single self the pleasurable consciousness of two such treasuries of thought and goodness; or that if, in the elation of my heart, I were forced, like the Barber of Midas, to tell my secret or die, that I should, like him, retire into the fields, and whisper it to the very grass; telling the flowers of earth of these who are born to become hereafter the flowers of heaven.

The reason that I cannot do this, thou wilt, upon ulterior thought, be at no loss to comprehend, when I tell thee that they are frequently about my path, which has now become a downward one; and often, all unconsciously to themselves, perhaps, do they shed rays of light across it, that my heart drinks up, when, as it were, I arrive at the passage over which they appear to my delighted fancy to have beamed; and though I might, for once or twice, go into the woods to ejaculate the expression of grateful feelings, that two such beings have ever been fashioned for man's irradiation and joy, yet beholding them often, and of late, I cannot satisfy myself without thy friendly aid, in order that thy entire world of readers may participate in the knowledge of such existence, if not in the pleasure of such society.

To these thy readers would I address these lines. If of the better sex, be they henceforth happier than ever in the graces of their proper destiny, and in the consciousness of the healing pleasure, the inappreciable delight, which they have power to awaken in the soul, even of the stricken and the departing. If, on the other hand, they be of my own, let them realize the means of increased felicity and virtue which Heaven, in Woman, hath bestowed on man. JOHN WATERS.

EARLY-MORNING EXERCISE.

VOL. XV.

'Methinks I scent the morning air!'

UP! up, arise!-haste, haste! the vernal morn
Purples the orient sky; and see! the rays
Of the young sun the eastern hills emblaze;
Ten thousand pearls their sparkling boughs adorn:
Quick, quick!-the simple robe, the hat of chip-
Let thy loose ringlets flutter in the breeze;

Soft, soft glide down the stairs; thy hand I seize ;
Mount we our coursers, and the gale outstrip.

How fresh the air! how mild the early sun!

How ring the wild notes through the neighboring wood!
Dustless the moist earth as we gallop on-

Rattle the pebbles of this shallow run;

Thunders the bridge: ha! ha! in drowsy mood,

Toss on the uneasy down who will

66

we, we are flown!

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]
« PreviousContinue »