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kind of vacant deliberation, to put on the watch, both the girls burst out in screams of laughter. They jumped up and stood before me, and laughed and laughed, till I assumed to be vexed, and told them, half-smiling all the time, to have done with such nonsense. I asked them what there was to laugh at, when a gentleman received his watch back from the jeweller's, clean?

'Oh! nothing, nothing,' and away they went again, half-crazy, one would suppose.

You know, reader, I enjoyed the scene very much; but I enjoyed, also, affecting to be vexed over it. I could get no explanation from either of the conspirators. So I put on my watch, and never parted with it again, and I wear it now as I write.*

It was utterly impossible for me to earn a living for myself and family, but I did all I could. I gladly made three dollars, two, even one dollar. I kept on, however, extending my acquaintance, and gaining, from day to day, an insight into matters I knew little of before. Had I permitted myself to do as many of my acquaintances did, and taken advantage of the situation of people who were thrown in my hands; had I chosen to lie, and deceive, and cheat, I could have squeezed out dollars enough to support us. But this I never did, I never could do. I acted honestly, and with conscience, and I found my reward in it. Alice knew precisely how we were situated. She knew I was falling behind-hand every month. She exerted herself to the utmost to economize. I could see this in so many little things, which she thought escaped my observation. Matilda was not one whit behind Alice. She took occasion, however, to abuse the world liberally, and declared often, she could see no justice in my being exposed to so much distress, while knaves had every thing their own way. Meanwhile, my petty debts accumulated in spite of me. For the first time, too, since my wife died, I was obliged to employ a physician. Charley got wet through and through in a soaking rain one Saturday, while enjoying his holiday. He came home chilled, and went to bed with a high fever. The next day, he was seized with inflammation of the lungs, and for a time, his life was despaired of.

Thus, to the burden of poverty was added the sickness of my child, and with it, a serious apprehension as to the result.

* I LEARNED, years after, that it was MATILDA who first discovered I did not carry my watch as usual. Thereupon, its whereabouts was suspected, and the pawn-ticket filched from my pocket. Then the two girls actually sold some of their trinkets, to raise the money to redeem the watch. C. E. P.

LITERARY NOTICES.

SONGS IN MANY KEYS. BY OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. Boston: TICKNOR AND FIELDS. 1861. HE who would make a pleasant gift to her further allusion spared by particular request may find the appropriate present in this neatly printed and bound little volume in which HOLMES has gathered together his latest music music we say, since all the lyrics therein are sweetly flowing, almost suggesting by their melodious cadence, the old dramatic conceit of 'enter a Song singing itself.' Yet he is no merely musical rhymer, this brave OLIVER of unpoetical paladins, since be it in ballad or in ode, hymn or word-picture, he gives always the sound thought and artistic impulse which works itself ever out into the most elaborate and delicate arabesques of beauty. 'Agnes,' the first of these poems, is truly exquisite, as perfect a 'lay' perhaps of the real • ballad order as any bard has penned in this century.

For the rest of the poems, let us say that they fully prove what all should know, that the true humorist is ever the one who touches most tenderly on pathos, and that gayety is most nearly allied to gravity in art, since it is the same secret law which lies at the foundation of a pun, or of an Iliad: the enforcing of harmony, feigned or real, into the incongruous. And no American writer has better exemplified this than OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES.

THE WORKS OF CHARLES DICKENS. Household Edition. Illustrated from Drawings by F. O. C. DARLEY and JOHN GILBERT. New-York: J. G. GREGORY, 46 Walker-Street. We have now on our table three additional volumes of this inimitable edition of DICKENS's works, comprising 'The Old Curiosity-Shop' entire, and some reprinted pieces, which fill out the third volume. We have always maintained that the public owes a debt of gratitude to accomplished publishers beyond the money price paid to them. To present books to their readers in such an attractive dress that they cannot fail to interest them in advance, is what Mr. GREGORY is at present doing. And we say to the admirers of DICKENS- and who does not admire him? - now is the time to lay aside the awkward and cumbrous edition you have already on your shelves and purchase this. Those who own none, will select the 'Household Edition' as a matter of

course.

SOME OF THE MISTAKES OF EDUCATED MEN. The Biennial Address before the Phrenakosmian Society of Pennsylvania College, Gettysburgh, Pa. By JOHN S. HART, LL.D. Delivered, September 18, 1861. Philadelphia: C. SHERMAN AND SON.

THE Comment and commendation which this address has drawn from the press is the best proof of its excellence. It is, indeed, so far beyond the usual stereotyped character of such orations, that we could wish the author would favor the public with a volume of equally well-worded and judicious reflections. As essays, they would add still more to his already well-established literary reputation. In truth, there are few 'intellectual men' who do not fall into mistakes, despite their intellect, and many of these are here indicated with great ability.

EDITOR'S TABLE.

Our New-Year's Greeting.

WITH this volume and number the KNICKERBOCKER MAGAZINE closes its fifty-eighth and enters upon its fifty-ninth volume; or, temporally speaking, begins the ripe manhood of its thirtieth year. Thirty years, according to popular computation, constitute an age; but though not more than an ordinary human life, they suffice in our instance to establish the KNICKERBOCKER as the oldest of magazines in America.

It is a matter of no little pride to review our past-to enumerate the first names among American writers who have contributed, and still contribute to our pages, and to reflect that amid all the changes of this bustling, ever-growing metropolis of the Western world, the KNICKERBOCKER still remains young and vigorous, still retains its faithful friends, who cherish with genuine love their literary favorite, and is still soundly American to the core, upholding all that is truly national with all its might and main. It is no exaggeration, no publisher's boast, to assert that had there been no other writing of the kind in existence, the volumes of the KNICKERBOCKER alone would show that the United States of America possess a literature ranking in excellence with the cotemporary productions of England. Is this too much to assert, when it is remembered that from the venerable IRVING to the latest and best known of American poets or prose-writers, there is scarcely one who has attained eminence who has not been a frequent contributor to our pages. There are no booksellers of note in any country in Europe who have not sold their thousands, either in the original English or in translation, of books which first saw the light, serially, in the KNICKERBOCKER, and more than one reputation is founded solely upon contributions to our Magazine.

There is a tendency in this driving, impulsive land of ours, where the new is habitually regarded as the true, to think that the old and long-established is naturally somewhat rusty, and that a magazine, like a man of ‘a certain age,' must necessarily lose vigor as time advances. This has not been the case with the KNICKERBOCKER. During the past year alone, our every number has boasted articles from the most eminent and popular writers and scholars; from those who boast long-established reputations, and from the most brilliant of the rising stars. Previous to the great panic caused by the war, and the consequent paralysis of prosperity, and immediately after the KNICKERBOCKER had passed into the hands of its present Publisher, its circulation had very nearly trebled, in consequence of the fresh array of talent attracted to it; and

notwithstanding the severe pressure of the times, which we have felt in common with all our cotemporaries, the united voice of the press has testified-we may say in most cases, with remarks of unfeigned surprise—that no publication in the country has maintained its excellence so well in the face of the most startling difficulties, while as regards vigor and energy at a time when it has been most required, no one will declare that we have been wanting. We have spoken freely and strongly when the greatest political crisis which ever weighed on this country, called for such utterances; and if we have offended a very few, we have been recompensed a thousand-fold by the hearty applause and cordial congratulations of those whose praise was of itself a proud reputation. These have been and are no times for sitting idly waiting for others to speak, when the great heart of the American people was throbbing and bursting with emotion and demanding a voice. So we spoke what we felt and believed, even as we believed in God's Providence and in eternal right; and the innumerable repetitions of our words and of those of our contributors, in the press, on the rostrum, and even in the pulpit, have proved that we had said what scores of thousands approved. The first religious journals of the most varied sects, have of late copied our articles most liberally and commented most favorably on our course, while many letters from eminent clergymen, the best judges of sincerity, attest the warmest sympathy for our views. Certainly no one who has read the KNICKERBOCKER during the past year will deny that in energy and earnestness it has fully kept up with any cotemporary, while as regards variety and general interest, it has fully equalled its best numbers at any stage of its long career.

If the American public deem that its oldest and most eminently representative periodical deserves support; if it approve earnest and honest utterances of manly opinion, at a time when to have none is to be cowardly and traitorous; if it have sympathy with a publication whose identification with so much that is near and dear to them has made of it a public institution, they will continue to extend to it that encouragement which is its life. The KNICKERBOCKER has been the college from which have graduated more young writers who have attained celebrity than in any other magazine of the kind in the world; for while rigidly exacting as regards merit in contributors, it has ever been urged by a good, old-fashioned, kindly spirit, which has prompted the encouragement of those who had talent in them while celebrity was as yet before them. Boasting the proudest array of names of any periodical in America, it has never published for the sake of a name, and this principle will ever be strictly adhered to. The writer unknown to fame will always find its Editor ready to aid by counsel or such encouragement as may be in his power, while all genial and hearty souls who may be disposed to add joyousness by song, jest, or anecdote to the GOSSIP, will receive, as of old, boon welcome. In a word, we enter upon our new volume, full of hope and inspired by a determination to do ever better and better. Our correspondents shall find us friendly as of old; our readers shall appreciate that 'the kindly spirit of Old KNICK,' still lives and breathes in the rare good things and choice dainties which we mean to spread before them. Old familiar faces shall smile amid newer guests; there shall be the old harp-sounds and lute-tinklings; by our faith, gentlemen, ''tis merrie in hall when beards wag all,' and we mean that

the old merriment and lordly revelry of my lord KNICK shall be kept up with proper spirit in this great hall of ours which hath echoed these thirty years with the footsteps of as gallant scholars and sweet dames as ever carolled song or told winsome legends of many lands. We mean that our readers shall love us with that special love which it has never been the fortune of a mere magazine to awaken as KNICK has done, that when two or three gather together, be it in strange lands, floating on the Nile, under Indian palms or northern pines, among the Sierras of California or in gay Paris by the Seine; if they be verily and trusty KNICKERBOCKERITES, then that word shall serve for free-masonic greeting, and they shall know by its utterance that all are gentlemen and scholars, bons Gaultiers and francs compagnons.

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And so reader -a happy New-Year to you, and a happier year to come thereafter! These be troublous times-war raging without, stern larums rolling through the icy air -ere a twelvemonth pass, many a bright eye which now follows the black lace-work of these lines will be dim in death, more than one upturned to the silent sky, on the grim battle-field, some perhaps worn away in prison, some returned to linger but a few days among the loved ones. Sic vita. But over joy-thoughts and death-forebodings; over reveries of revelry and dreams of woe rises the proud thought that our friends are of those who will be brave among the bravest, gentle among the gentlest, courteous and noble as the best on earth. Friends, let us hear often from you; write us from the camp; tell us how it goes with you; speak from the cottage inland, from the villa by the sea, from city and village. You will be ever welcome, and we trust ever be glad that you have answered cordially to this our cordial NewYear's Greeting.

WHILE of late years, New-Year's calling has been quite as merry as of old, it is pleasant to observe that the habit more honored in the breach than i' th' observance, of steadily drinking and of inviting to drink, of toping like stout Friar Johns of the Funnels, and of swigging it off in the manner of sturdy toss-pots, in Sherries, Madeira, Brandy, Rum, Whiskey, and other liquors - it is pleasant, we say — observe, reader, that talking even of such things makes an intoxicated sentence and tipsy involutions of construction — and, in fact, as we were going on to say, if we can ever get ourselves out of the meshes of this snake-in-the-boot of a paragraph — that we are glad on the whole to observe that our New-Years are becoming far more sober than of old.

Such was at least, the opinion of Kate HarringtON, when after due observation of the melancholy effects of whiskey-punchiness and Sherry-cob'ob--lerism, she 'indicted' the following bill against her treating sisters on New-Year's Day in ye Metropolis of Newe York, whilome Nieuw Amsterdam, sainted over by the ever blessed Santa Claus. Verily, she speaketh truly, doth this KATE of Cold Water — and even the old Knickerbockers, could they rise from their graves, would now applaud her - for what did they themselves say — hard swilling blades as they were?

VOL. LIX.

Wen de Wijn ist in de Mann,
Den ist de Wijsheid in de Kann.

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