For there, 'twixt the black walls uprising, On, on, with a thunderous clanging, Through the echoing gorges we go, Heights a thousand feet over us hanging, Depths a thousand below. And here, where the rock wall runs curving, What heart fears for death now, or danger, With his Fatherland's freedom for prize? What is death to the yoke of the stranger, On a free neck that lies? But darker the cliffs now are closing Above to a cavernous glen, All seems in harmony-sea, land, and skyWith the sad peace of one, who, yielding all, Dark as death, hidden deep from day's rosing, No longer fights or strives; I too would try A horror of men. Above us, on black wings are wheeling, New startled, the raven and kite; On our heads, from the damp crevice stealing, Fall dews of the night. Beneath, from the valleys mist-clouded, But in us is no heart of a maiden, With a purpose too stern are we laden; The dews from our heads we shake, scorning; For there see a cleft in the ridges, That rise like a wall in our way, There, there is the pass; there the foemen The great sun, all gold! That is thoroughly spirited, and there are one or two other poems which are more than spirited, which have a real grandeur of tone in them. But for the most part, Mr. Bourdillon's promise consists in the clear and beautiful terseness with which he can catch the essence of a transient shade of thought or feeling, and chisel it out in words which savor of a common origin with the purest sentiment. To be at peace, shake off this painful thrall, Cut out this pricking sorrow from my heart, Lay bare and probe my long-concealed smart. eight hundred skins of birds, comprising probably two hundred species, of which he hopes that twenty or twenty-five may prove to be new. JUDGING from his report, Signor D'Alber-natural-history collections, but he obtained tis appears to have carried out his recent expedition in the "Neva" up the Fly River, New Guinea, under very great difficulties. He experienced constant hostility on the part of the natives, and was much troubled by the conduct of part of his crew. In many parts the natives were found to be very numerous, and on one day he estimates that he saw two thousand on the banks. On that occasion he passed a large village where there were more than five hundred people on the bank, whom he describes as beautifully dressed with white feathers, and their bodies painted in many colors." They wore white shells for purposes of ornament and protection, and had "head-dresses of white feathers of cacatua and red and yellow Paradise bird." Signor D'Albertis discovered a large tributary entering the Fly River from the north-east; but, owing to the various troubles he met with, he was not so successful as he expected with his THE glaciers of the western Himalayas, according to measurements recently given in the Tour de Monde, far surpass in extent any hitherto examined outside of the polar regions. In the Mustagh range, two` glaciers immediately adjoining one another possess a united length of sixty-five miles. Another glacier in the neighborhood is twenty-one miles in length, and from one to two miles in width. Its upper portion is at a height of twenty-four thousand feet above the level of the sea, and its lower portion, terminating in masses of ice two hundred and fifty feet in height and three miles in breadth, is sixteen thousand feet above the sea. Nature. For EIGHT DOLLARS, remitted directly to the Publishers, the LIVING AGE will be punctually forwarded for a year, free of postage. An extra copy of THE LIVING AGE is sent gratis to any one getting up a club of Five New Subscribers. Remittances should be made by bank draft or check, or by post-office money-order, if possible. If neither of these can be procured, the money should be sent in a registered letter. All postmasters are obliged to register letters when requested to do so. Drafts, checks and money-orders should be made payable to the order of LITTELL & GAY. Single Numbers of THE LIVING AGE, 18 cents. Count not your grief's excess too far above The worth of those you serve, nor all disdain The lesser pressure of the barren pain The light of love in love's surcease may prove. Pity the poor who are by God's decree Your pensioners, and fear not, for your part, To harbor love, how dear soe'er he be. O love that cometh, love that may depart, The gates of life are set so wide by thee! The lord of love can enter where thou art! August 11th. EMILY PFEIFFER. Spectator. II. LOVE FOR him alone the exultant thrushes call, And the sweet winds blow benedictional ! That all this radiant world was wrought for him! One blissful faith his life divinely cheers With heavenly joys and fears, That sometimes leave his sight in holy tears! And through his soul, rich-warmed by sacred heat, Dear memories move and meet, Like shadowy ripples over golden wheat. Belgravia. EDGAR FAWCETT. Rests on the mortal face of Love's twin star, Love turns dismayed, as if that shadowy bar Could shut him off forever in his dearth; He turns within, and lo! a shy, new birth, A spark of light from near, or from afar, Pierces the darkness till, a fiery car, It lifts him into light more wonder-worth. Sad love! bewail not tho' you be bereft, Nor faint not for the weary road you fare; The spark enkindled when your heart is cleft, The strength that grows from burthens that you bear, Are gifts of grace for many that were left Undowered, but for treasure you must share. II. O ye elect of sorrow and of love Who bear for others' weal a double strain, And share the surplus of love's costly gain With hearts his presence doth more feebly move, SUMMER. (FOR A PICTURE.) From The Cornhill Magazine. THE FIRST EDINBURGH REVIEWERS. A set in the northern half of the island. WHEN browsing at random in a respectable library, one is pretty sure to hit upon the early numbers of the Edinburgh Review, and prompted in consequence to ask oneself the question, what are the intrinsiculus of literary ambition. In politics the merits of writing which produced so great most rampant Conservatism, rendered bitan effect upon our grandfathers? The ter by the recent experience of the French Review, we may say, has lived into a Revolution, exercised a sway in Scotland third generation. The last survivor of more undisputed and vigorous than it is the original set has passed away; and now easy to understand. The younger there are but few relics even of that men who inclined to Liberalism, were natsecond galaxy of authors amongst whom urally prepared to welcome an organ for Macaulay was the most brilliant star. the expression of their views. AccordOne may speak, therefore, without shockingly a knot of clever lads (Smith was ing existing susceptibilities, of the Review in its first period, when Jeffrey, Sydney Smith, and Brougham were the most prominent names. A man may still call himself middle-aged and yet have a distinct memory of Brougham courting, rather too eagerly, the applause of the Social Science Association; of Jeffrey, as he appeared in his kindly old age, when he could hardly have spoken sharply of a Lake poet; and even of the last outpourings of the irrepressible gaiety of Sydney Smith. But the period of their literary activity is already so distant as to have passed into the domain of history. It is the same thing to say that it already belongs in some degree to the neighboring or overlapping domain of fiction. 31, Jeffrey 29, Brown 24, Horner 24, and Brougham 23), met in the third (not, as Smith afterwards said, the "eighth or ninth ") story of a house in Edinburgh and started the journal by acclamation. The first number appeared in October 1802, and produced, we are told, an "electrical" effect. Its old humdrum rivals collapsed before it. Its science, its philosophy, its literature were equally admired. Its politics excited the wrath and dread of Tories and the exultant delight of Whigs. It was, says Cockburn, a "pillar of fire," a far-seen beacon suddenly lighted in a dark place. Its able advocacy of political principles was as striking as its judicial air of criticism, unprecedented in periodical literature. To appreciate its influence, we must remember, says Sydney Smith, that in those days a number of reforms, now familiar to us all, were still regarded as startling innovations. The Catholics were not emancipated, nor the game-laws softened, nor the Court of Chancery reformed, nor the slave-trade abolished. There is, in fact, already a conventional history of the early Edinburgh Review, repeated without hesitation in all literary histories and assumed in a thousand allusions, which becomes a little incredible when we take down the dusty old volumes, where dingy calf has replaced the original splendors of the blue and yellow, and which have inevitably lost much of their savor during more than half a century's repose. The story of the original publication has been given by the chief founders. Edinburgh, at the beginning of the century, was one of those provincial centres of intellectual activity which have an Were they put down solely by the Edinincreasing difficulty in maintaining them-burgh Review? That, of course, would selves against metropolitan attractions. not be alleged by its most ardent admirIn the last half of the eighteenth century, ers; though Sydney Smith certainly holds such philosophical activity as existed in that the attacks of the Edinburgh were the country seemed to have taken refuge amongst the most efficient causes of the Cruel punishment still disgraced the criminal code, libel was put down with vindictive severity, prisoners were not allowed counsel in capital cases, and many other grievances now wholly or partially redressed were still flourishing in full force. |