are many last days. There is a last day of the nursery, of the school, of juvenile obedience, of parental authority; there is a last day at our first home, and a last day at every other place that becomes our home in the sequel; there are last days of companionship and of rivalry, of business and of vanity; of promise and exertion, of failure and success; last days of love and of friendship, enjoyment and endearment; every day in its turn is the last to all that went before it. Every year has its last day. Amidst the festivities of Christmas arrives the close of the months; to remind us of the end of all earthly fruition. The most reprobate of men desire to die in peace; on the last night in December, therefore, we should lie down with the same dispositions as if we were making our bed in the grave; on the first morning of January we should rise up with the same hopes, as if the trumpet had summoned us to the resurrection of the just: that moment should be to us as the end of time, and this as the beginning of eternity. if "To every thing beneath the sun there comes a last day: from this point our meditations began; at this point they must conclude, leaving those who may have accompanied the writer thus far, to pursue at their leisure the moral inferences associated with the whole. The facts themselves, few, simple, and common-place as they are, cannot have been made to pass, even in this imperfect exhibition, through intelligent minds, without impressing upon them feelings of awe, apprehension and humility, prompting to immediate and unsparing self-examination. From this there can be nothing to fear; from the neglect of it every thing; for however alarming the discoveries of evil unsuspected, or peril unknown may be, such discoveries had better be made now, while escape is before us, than in that day when the secrets of all hearts shall be revealed, and escape will be impossible,—that day which of all others is most emphatically called 'The Last Day? "The Lucid Interval" will afford a fair specimen of the author's claims to poetical eminence, and, if our judgment is not much deceived, the following beautiful stanzas are very nearly related to the "World before the Flood." "A LUCID INTERVAL. Oh! light is pleasant to the eye, And health comes rustling on the gale, Whose shadows mock them down the dale; Nature as fresh and fragrant seems As I have met her in my dreams. For I have been a prisoner long To every form of beauty blind; But now the blood, the blood returns, My limbs break loose, they cast their chains, Tracks to a point the eagle's flight. I long to climb those old grey rocks, Range, the green hills with herds and flocks, Then mount the lark's victorious wing, O Earth! in maiden innocence, O Earth! Earth! Earth! for man's offence, The thorn, harsh emblem of the curse, And Death himself, with all the woes Life, life, with all its burdens dear! One generous hope, one chastening ill? But these have angels never known, Storm, lightning, shipwreck, visit not : Well, I will bear what all have borne, Live my few years, and fill my place: Rent one by one from my embrace, Whence came I?-Memory cannot say ; Far as eternity can go: Thy love to win, thy wrath to flee, There is much to admire in the matter of these volumes; and notwithstanding a little redundancy of metaphor, and a too liberal use of the lima labor-which is apt to deprive prose of a certain free and natural air, which answers to the picturesque of the artists-the style is pure, easy, and perspicuous. It abounds with lively and beautiful imagery, whose only fault is that of being too good for its station. In poesy would have delighted; in prose it is almost lost upon us. it PETER SCHLEMIHL, from the German of Lamotte Fouqué, with plates by George Cruickshank, 12mo. pp. 165. Whittakers. : This tale of the German school, is amusing and interesting, but defies all the general rules of criticism.-Peter Schlemihl is entrapped by the most subtle of all deceivers, to exchange his shadow for the purse of Fortunatus and a variety of other equally productive et ceteras. He is charmed at finding himself possessed of a source of unlimited wealth, and acts with consistent foolishness, under the impulse naturally felt, on obtaining an acquisition, as singular as it was unexpected. When the first scene is passed, and he begins to make use of the treasures at his command,—which he proposes to do very rationally and liberally;-he suddenly finds himself exposed to many difficulties and disasters from the circumstance of his being unattended by a shadow he becomes a marked man; the outcast of society. To extricate himself from this wretched situation he has recourse to every plan that prudence can suggest, and in adopting these he is much assisted by the exertions of a faithful servant; and thwarted and perplexed by the baseness of a rascally one. After a long course of suffering, "the tall grey man," who tricked him of his shadow, offers to restore it, upon the signing of a contract to deliver up his "eternal jewel" to him, when he shall depart this life. He resists this temptation with exemplary fortitude, and passes a life of great wretchedness, in consequence of his early act of indiscretion. Fastidious readers will find much to censure, but those who seek amusement, and are willing to be pleased, may be much gratified with the perusal of this little romance which is not without its moral. The second chapter has a tendency to enhance the gifts of nature and to depreciate those of fortune. Although decidedly outré, it is sketched with a feeling and consistency which must engage the sympathy of all kind-hearted persons. "At last," says poor Peter, "I came to myself, and hastened from a place, where apparently I had nothing more to do. I first filled my pockets with gold, then firmly secured the strings of the purse round my neck, taking care to conceal the purse itself in my bosom. I left the park unnoticed, reached the high road, and bent my way to the town. I was walking thoughtfully towards the gate, when I heard a voice behind me: Holla! young squire! holla! don't you hear!' I looked round-an old woman was calling after me;- Take care, sir, take care -you have lost your shadow!'-' Thanks, good woman.'-I threw her a piece of gold for her well-meant counsel, and walked away under the trees. "At the gate I was again condemned to hear from the sentinel, where has the gentleman left his shadow?' and immediately afterwards a couple of women exclaimed, good heavens! the poor fellow has no shadow!' I began to be vexed, and carefully avoided walking in the sun. This I could not always do: for instance, in the Broad-street, where I was next compelled to cross; and as ill luck would have it, at the very moment when the boys were being released from school. A confounded hunch-backed vagabond-I see him at this moment,had observed that I wanted a shadow. He instantly began to bawl out to the young tyros of the suburbs, who first criticised me, and then bespattered me with mud: Respectable people are accustomed to carry their shadows with them when they go into the sun." Í scattered handfuls of gold among them to divert their attention; and with the assistance of some compassionate souls, sprung into a hackney-coach.' "As soon as I found myself alone in the rolling vehicle, I began to weep bitterly. My inward emotion suggested to me, that even as in this world gold weighs down both merit and virtue, so a shadow might possibly be more valuable than gold itself; and that, as I had sacrificed my riches to my integrity on other occasions, so now I had given up my shadow for mere wealth; and what ought, what could become of me? "I continued still sadly discomposed, when the coach stopped before the old tavern. I was shocked at the thought of again entering that vile garret. I sent for my baggage, took up the miserable bundle with contempt, threw them some pieces of gold, and ordered to be driven to the principal hotel. The house faced the north, so I had nothing to fear from the sun. I dismissed the driver with gold, selected the best front room, and locked myself in as soon as possible. "And how do you imagine I employed myself? Oh! my beloved Chamisso, I blush to confess it even to you. I drew forth the luckless purse from my bosom, and impelled by a sort of madness which burned and spread within me like a furious conflagration, I shook out gold, and gold, and gold, and still more gold:-strewed it over the floor, trampled on it, made it tinkle, and feasting my weak senses in the glitter and the sound, I added pile to pile, till I sunk exhausted on the golden bed. I rolled about and wallowed in delicious delirium. And so the day passed by, and so the evening. My door remained únopened, and night found me still reposing on the gold, when sleep at length overcame me. "Then I dreamed of you. I fancied I was standing close to the glass door of your little apartment, and saw you sitting at your work-table, between a skeleton and a parcel of dried plants. Haller, Humboldt, and Linné lay open before you ;— on your sofa were a volume of Goethe, and The Magic Ring. I looked at you for a long time, then at every thing around you, and then at you again; but you moved not-you breathed not-you were dead. "I awoke: it seemed to be yet early-my watch had stopped;-I felt as if I had been bastinadoed-yet both hungry and thirsty, for since the previous morning I had eaten nothing. With weariness and disgust I pushed away from me the gold, which but a little time before had satisfied my foolish heart: I now in my perplexity knew not how to dispose of it. But it could not remain there. I tried to put it again into the purse-no; none of my windows opened upon the sea. I was obliged to content myself by dragging it with immense labour and difficulty to a large cupboard, which stood in a recess, where I packed it up. I left only a few handfuls lying about. When I had finished my labour, I sat down exhausted in an arm-chair, and waited till the people of the house began to stir. I ordered breakfast, and the presence of the landlord, as soon as practicable. "With this man I arranged the future management of my household. He recommended to me for my personal servant a certain Bendel, whose honest and intelligent countenance instantly interested me. It was he, who from that moment accompanied me through life with sympathizing attachment, and shared with me my gloomy destiny. I passed the whole day in my apartments with servants out of place, shoemakers, tailors, and shop-keepers; I provided myself with all necessaries, and bought large quantities of jewels and precious stones, merely to get rid of some of my piles of gold: but it seemed scarcely possible. to diminish the heap. "Meanwhile I contemplated my situation with most anxious doubts. I dared not venture one step from my door, and at evening ordered forty wax lights to be kindled in my saloon, before I left the dark chamber. I thought with horror of the dreadful scene with the school-boys, and determined, whatever it might cost, once more to sound public opinion. The moon, at this season, illumined the night. Late at evening I threw a wide cloak around me, pulled down my hat over my eyes, and glided out of the house trembling like a criminal. I walked first along the shadows of the houses to a remote open place; I then abandoned their protection, stepped out into the moonshine, resolved to learn my destiny from the lips of the passers-by. "But spare me, my friend, the painful repetition of what I was condemned to undergo! The deepest pity seemed to inspire the fairest sex; but my soul was Another Novel of Fouqué's. not less wounded by this than by the contumely of the young, the proud disdain of the old, especially of those stout and well-fed men, whose dignified shadows seemed to do them honour. A lovely graceful maiden, apparently accompanying her parents, who seemed not to look beyond their own footsteps, accidentally fixed her sparkling eyes upon me. She obviously started as she remarked my shadowless figure; she hid her beautiful face beneath her veil, hung down her head, and passed silently on. "I could bear it no longer. Salt streams burst forth from my eyes, and with a broken heart I hurried tremblingly back into darkness. The plates by George Cruickshank are almost enough to persuade one that" Peter Schlemihl" is a true narrative. How can we doubt the possibility of selling and delivering a shadow, when we see it, as in the frontispiece, actually laid hold of, and lifted from the ground? Or how can we doubt the validity of the transfer, when we behold, in the other sketches, its former possessor in the midst of umbrageous forests, and by day-light, moon-light, and lamp-light, without even "the shadow of a shade?" DUET BY LADY CAROLINE LAMB. From Ada Reis. "The kiss that's on thy lip impress'd THE ANSWER. *I go but ere I go from thee, : Give back what thou hast ta'en from me A heart that knew nor care nor guile, "Hope not for this, thy course is run; The dew drops with the setting sun, And see the winds pass scornful by: A blight clouds o'er thy early fame. |