characteristics. Naval warfare has been carried into the interior of a continent, and navies, as if by magic, lanched from among the depths of the forest! The bosoms of peaceful lakes, which but a short time since were scarcely navigated by man, except to be skimmed by the light canoe of the savage, have all at once been ploughed by hostile ships. The vast silence that had reigned for ages on these mighty waters, was broken by the thunder of artillery, and the affrighted savage stared with amazement from his covert, at the sudden apparition of a seafight amid the solitudes of the wilderness.

The peal of war has once sounded on that lake, but probably will never sound again. The last roar of cannon that died along her shores, was the expiring note of British domination. Those vast internal seas will, perhaps, never again be the separating space between contending nations; but will be embosomed within a mighty empire; and this victory, which decided their fate, will stand unrivalled and alone, deriving lustre and perpetuity from its singleness.

In future times, when the shores of Erie shall hum with busy population; when towns and cities shall brighten where now extend the dark and tangled forest; when ports shall spread their arms, and lofty barks shall ride where now the canoe is fastened to the stake; when the present age shall have grown into venerable antiquity, and the mists of fable begin to gather round its history, then will the inhabitants of Canada look back to this battle we record, as one of the romantic achievements of the days of yore. It will stand first on the page of their local legends, and in the marvellous tales of the borders. The fisherman, as he loiters along the beach, will point to some half buried cannon, corroded with the rust of time, and will speak of ocean warriors, that came from the shores of the Atlantic,while the boatman, as he trims his sail to the breeze, will chant in rude ditties the name of Perry, the early hero of Lake Erie.

HARMONY.-BOWRING.

I bade the Day-break bring to me
Its own sweet song of ecstasy:
An answer came from leafy trees,
And waking birds, and wandering bees,
And wavelets on the water's brim-
The matin hymn-the matin hymn!

I asked the Noon for music then:
It echoed forth the hum of men ;
The sounds of labor on the wind,
The loud-voiced eloquence of mind;
The heart-the soul's sublime pulsations-
The song-the shout-the shock of nations.

I hasten'd from the restless throng,
To soothe me with the Evening song:
The dark'ning heaven was vocal still,
I heard the music of the rill-

The home-bound bee-the vesper bell-
The cicada—and philomel.

Thou Omnipresent Harmony!

Shades, streams, and stars are full of thee;
On every wing-in every sound,
Thine all-pervading power is found;
Some chord to touch-some tale to tell-
Deep-deep within the Spirit's cell.

1

INDIAN SUMMER.-STORY.

What can be more beautiful or more attractive than this season in New England? The sultry heat of summer has passed away; and a delicious coolness at evening succeeds the genial warmth of the day. The labors of the husbandman approach their natural termination; and he gladdens with the near prospect of his promised reward. The earth swells with the increase of vegetation. The fields wave with their yellow and luxuriant harvests. The trees put forth their darkest foliage, half shading and half revealing their ripened fruits, to tempt the appetite of man, and proclaim the goodness of his Creator. Even in scenes of another sort, where nature reigns alone in her own majesty, there is much to awaken religious enthusiasm. As yet, the forests stand clothed in their dress of undecayed magnificence. The winds, that rustle through their tops, scarcely disturb the silence of the shades below. The mountains and the vallies glow in warm green, or lively russet. The rivulets flow on with a noiseless current, reflecting back the images of many a glossy insect, that dips his

wings in their cooling waters. The mornings and evenings are still vocal with the notes of a thousand warblers, which plume their wings for a later flight. Above all, the clear blue sky, the long and sunny calms, the scarcely whispering breezes, the brilliant sunsets, lit up with all the wondrous magnificence of light, and shade, and color, and slowly settling down into a pure and transparent twilight. These, these are days and scenes, which even the cold cannot behold without emotion; but on which the meditative and pious gaze with profound admiration; for they breathe of holier and happier regions beyond the grave.

ON THE SPRING.-GRAY.

Lo! where the rosy-bosomed hours,
Fair Venus' train, appear,
Disclose the long-expecting flowers,
And wake the purple year,
The attic warbler pours her throat
Responsive to the cuckoo's note,

The untaught harmony of spring,
While, whispering pleasure as they fly,
Cool zephyrs through the clear blue sky
Their gathered fragrance fling.

Where'er the oak's thick branches stretch
A broader, browner shade,
Where'er the rude and moss-grown beech
O'er-canopies the glade,

Beside some water's rushy brink
With me the Muse shall sit, and think

(At ease reclined in rustic state)
How vain the ardor of the crowd,
How low, how little, are the proud,
How indigent the great!

Still is the toiling hand of care,
The panting herds repose,

Yet hark! how through the peopled air,

The busy murmur glows!

The insect youth are on the wing,
Eager to taste the honied spring,
And float amid the liquid noon;
Some lightly o'er the current skim,
Some show their gayly-gilded trim,
Quick-glancing to the sun.

To contemplation's sober eye,
Such is the race of man,
And they that creep and they that fly,
Shall end where they began.
Alike the busy and the

gay

But flutter through life's little day,

In fortune's varying colors drest;
Brushed by the hand of rough mischance,
Or chilled by age, their airy dance
They leave, in dust to rest.

UNWRITTEN POETRY.-WILLIS.

There is poetry that is not written. It is living in the hearts of many to whom rhyme is a mystery. As I here use it, it is delicate perception; something which is in the nature, enabling one man to detect harmony, and know forms of beauty better than another. It is like a peculiar gift of vision; not creating a new world, but making the world we live in more visible; enabling us to combine and separate and arrange elements of beauty into the fair proportions of a picture. The poet hears music in common sounds, and sees loveliness by the wayside. There is not a change in the sky, nor a noise of the water, nor a sweet human voice, which does not bring him pleasure. He sees all the light and hears all the music about him-and this is poetry.

To one thus gifted, nature is a friend of many sweet offices and true consolations. Call it visionary if you will, she has glad fellowship for the happy, and medicine for the wounded spirit, and calin communion for gentle thoughts, which are the life of his moral being. Let him seek her when he will, if his heart be any thing but dead, the poor sympathy of the world is a mockery to her ministering influences. I dare go farther. The power of nature over such a mind as I have described, is,

in cases of extreme mental suffering, or abandonment, stronger than any other moral influence. There is something in its deep and serene beauty, inexpressibly soothing to the diseased mind. It steals over it silently, and gradually, like an invisible finger, erasing its dark lines and removing its brooding shadows, and before he is aware, he is loving, and enjoying, and feeling, as he did in better days when his spirit was untroubled. To those who see nothing about them but physical convenience, these assertions may seem extravagant; but they are nevertheless true; and blessed be the Author of our faculties, there are some who know, by experience, that nature is a friend and a physician to the sick and solitary spirit of her worshipper.

EVENING.-CROLY.

'Tis eve, the soft, the purple hour;
The dew is glistening on the bower,
The lily droops its silver head,
The violet slumbers on its bed;
Heavy with sleep the leaflets close,
Veiling thy bloom, enchanting rose,
Still gazing on the western ray,
The last sweet worshipper of day.

IDLENESS-WILLIS.

The rain is playing in soft pleasant tune
Fitfully on the skylight, and the shade
Of the fast-flying clouds across my book
Passes with delicate change. My merry fire
Sings cheerfully to itself; my musing cat
Purrs as she wakes from her unquiet sleep,
And looks into my face as if she felt
Like me the gentle influence of the rain.
Here have I sat since morn, reading sometimes,
And sometimes listening to the faster fall
Of the large drops, or rising with the stir
Of an unbidden thought, have walked awhile
With the slow steps of indolence, my room,
And then sat down composedly again
To my quaint book of olden poetry.