Strike louder,-louder still A shout that shook the pall One shriek," They come, they come," The gates swing idly round, What honor voice nor sound- TO AN IDIOT. Spirit that look'st from two cold eyes, Thy gaze is restless: monuments, Of conscious aim, and sky, and flowers, A being not of earth nor men, They pass thee by, or look with scorn Poor wretch is all thy lot on earth Thou hast a soul, unknown to thee, Of nobler worth than all of earth Thy vacant stare is seeing. Hast heard of Milton, Shakspeare, Burns, Of Newton, Boyle, or Scott? Thy idiot laugh respondeth well, Hast heard of lofty seraphim, That tread the courts of heaven, Of bright intelligences down To dark abysses driven? Perchance to them the crowds that pass Who chained the lightning's wing, and set Are but the sport of frenzied aims, Of hopes like idiot visions bright, Not much of wisdom, power, and truth, Communion high with sage and saint, With God and angel holding, The mysteries of time and earth, Of soul and sense unfolding. THE TRANCE-SLEEPER. What hast thou, sleeper, seen And still, and fair? Six times o'er hill and vale "Oh! tones of earth, again From the bright scenes in which "I have been far away, That holds on fading shores Each fetter broken- Soft words of music heard- "Sunlight that never set, Deck'd Eden's bowers. "And then I stood beside Not one deceiving word, Or broken vow To dull the smile of joy. On each fair brow. CYRUS. "But heart to heart there brought Its wealth of love, And peace within the soul The sweet links wove. Whose deepest trust is now "The dead! the dead! once more Became to me All that gives hope, and life, Bitter and sad will now The contrast seem Between my waking hours And that bright dream. "Yet shall its memory be Of gods or goddesses, with all our dreams Became a whelming eddy. There she stands, This truth upon us all :-that had she been She had but been so much the less divine! LINES BY MISS ROBERTS. L. D. There is a deep low music on the wind, Be they in velvet clad, or russet stole, In hall, or hut, theirs is that low sweet chime : Solemn, yet cheerful-speaking to the soul Of joys that rest not in this stranger clime. Nor yet the jarring sounds of bustling life, Yet few do hear it either ease or pride, Or thoughts unholy, folly, grief, or crime, Whelming the soul beneath their rushing tide, Hindereth the coming of that low sweet chime. Men's hearts are heavy, or they would not slight Their spirits' oneness with so pure a strainThough faint, as when the far-off torrent's might Seems as a murmur stealing o'er the plain. From source far mightier, comes that low sweet sound, Than deep, deep waters, thundering on the ear From harps, and mingled voices, that resound With anthem high, through Heaven's eternal year. CHURCH, BERKSHIRE. O reverence ye those men of old Here, with them, 'neath the rustic roof, God bless you in your rustic frocks, Mere self-ceremonious pride, Pew'd in 'twixt polish'd oak, And hanging up his paltry arms From all such self-exalted worms Towards his brothers, on the forms, What light of hope must shine within Or, surely, they could never kneel, Upon each reverend brow. God of the poor! wilt thou not hear L. D. A SPANISH journal states that a short time back, as a dealer in leeches was travelling on a by-road in Estremadura, he was stopped by a band of thieves, who demanded his money. He assured them that he had none about him, having expended all he had brought with him. Having ascertained that he had told the truth, they, in revenge for their disappointment, thrust his head into the sack in which he carried his leeches, and bound it tightly round his neck. Some country-people passing by not long afterwards found him dead; he having been bled to death by his own stock.-Galignani. From the Spectator. THE REV. D. P. KIDDER'S BRAZIL.* MR. KIDDER is an American clergyman, who spent some years in Brazil, as an assistant missionary to Mr. Spaulding; a main object of the mission being the circulation of Bibles and tracts in the Portuguese tongue, besides the general attention of clergymen to Protestant residents and Protestant crews in the harbor of Rio Janerio. In the course of his duties Mr. Kidder made a landtour through the province of San Paulo, which adjoins that of Rio Janerio on the south; and subsequently undertook a coasting steam-voyage from Rio to the river Amazon, sojourning for a time at all the intermediate ports; of which the best known are Bahia, Pernambuco, Paranham, and Para, situate on the southern estuary of the Amazon. The knowledge acquired during his residence in Brazil Mr. Kidder has presented to the world in the volumes before us; which embrace an outline of its history, a narrative of the author's journeyings, with general observations upon the country, and its social, political, and religious condition. Except the common touching-place for vessels of all kinds, Rio Janeiro, we have had little information of late years respecting Brazil: for Lieut. Smyth's Journey from Lima to Para only embraced a descent of the Amazon, and even that was published in 1836. Mr. Kidder's work may therefore be welcomed as an addition to our library, though his Sketches are scarcely equal to his time and opportunity. To judge him by an English test, some of his matter was needless; and his arrangement is certainly none of the best. Part of his work is a mere compilation of the history of Brazil, mostly compiled if not quoted from Southey and Armitage. Many of his own accounts are of a similar cast, though of a more original character. He describes a town as if he were writing a guide-book, and a province in the style of an article for a cyclopædia; and many of his political sketches, involving narratives of late events or notices of contemporary persons, have a vague and general style of description. This, however, might have been of less consequence, had history, topography, and public affairs, been kept distinct from the personal narrative, so as to form entire and separate sections of the book for those who wished to consult them. Unfortunately, they are mixed up together in a continuous order, separated only by chapters, and not always that. The order, too, is not chronological, but accidental. The time of telling the story of a town or province depends upon the period of Mr. Kidder's reaching it. The reader has consequently to drone through much that he may not care about knowing, and after all cannot get a complete or consecutive view of the history or topography abridged. This arrangement necessarily militates against the effect of Mr. Kidder's narrative of his journeyings, because the reader arrives at them with a wearied mind. But, putting this aside, he cannot be considered a powerful or graphic describer. Something of the vagueness of the pulpit and the platform hangs about his style. The diffuseness Sketches of Residence and Travels in Brazil; embracing Historical and Geographical Notices of the Empire and its several Provinces. By the Reverend Daniel P. Kidder, A.M. In two volumes, with Illustrations.Wiley & Putnam. which the necessity of extemporaneous address is apt to produce in men who must speak upon all occasions, and find words if they lack matter, is visible in Sketches of Residence and Travels in Brazil. Perhaps, too, the author is by nature somewhat deficient in that penetrating acumen which, seizing the essential qualities of things, presents to the reader a characteristic portrait. A better arrangement and better training would have produced a better work, but scarcely have given to Mr. Kidder this last excellence. As it is, his Sketches are often jogtrot, unless the incident or the image is so striking in itself that its leading features can scarcely escape. Such is the case with many of the sketches especially of the Amazon, and of Para, a decaying city on the banks of the most magnificent river in the world. Here it is. A BRAZILIAN CITY. "This neglect of improvement is not the worst consequence that has followed the revolutions and disorders that for many years prevailed at intervals in this ill-fated town. Many are the finely-located streets where scarcely a solitary foot-path penetrates the thick and ever-growing bushes that overspread them; while throughout the suburbs one is momentarily passing forsaken tenements and the walls of houses, many of them of a superior order, no longer occupied. Beyond the actual precincts of the city, one may instantly bury himself in a dense forest, and become shut out from every indication of the near residence of man. "The coolness of these silent shades is always inviting; but the stranger must beware lest he loses his way and never return. Many stories are told of persons who became bewildered in the mazes of these thickets, and though but a short distance off, were utterly unable to find their way back to town. Several are believed to have perished in this manner." AN AMAZONIAN FOREST. "The road leads nearly the whole way through a deep unbroken forest, of a density and a magnitude of which I had, before penetrating it, but a faint conception. Notwithstanding this is one of the most public roads leading to or from the city, yet it is only for a short distance passable for carriages: indeed, the branches of trees are not unfrequently in the way of the rider on horseback. A negro is sent through the path periodically with a sabre to clip the increasing foliage and branches before they become too formidable: thus the road is kept open and pleasant. Notwithstanding the heat of the sun in these regions at noonday, and the danger of too much exposure to its rays, yet an agreeable coolness always pervades those retreats of an Amazonian forest, whose lofty and umbrageous canopy is almost impenetrable. The brilliancy of the sun's glare is mellowed by innumerable reflections upon the polished surface of the leaves. Many of the trees are remarkably straight, and very tall. Some of them are decked from top to bottom with splendid flowers and parasites, while the trunks and boughs of nearly all are interlaced with innumerable runners and creeping vines. "These plants form a singular feature of the borders of the Amazon that they appear in their more fertile regions of Brazil. But it is on the greatest strength and luxuriance. They twist around the trees, climbing up to their tops, then grow down to the ground, and taking root, spring | kept up wherever they have a festal character; up again, and cross from bough to bough and from but the religious spirit and bigotry seem to have tree to tree, wherever the wind carries their limber departed together. The monastic establishments shoots, till the whole woods are hung with their are restricted by law, and there seems little dispogarlanding. This vegetable cordage is sometimes sition in the people to enter them. The vices and so closely interwoven that it has the appearance of ignorance of the clergy are topics of common disnet-work, which neither birds nor beasts can easily course, and even of official rebuke. No obstacles pass through. Some of the stems are as thick as were thrown in the way of the mission's distribua man's arm. They are round or square, and tion of Bibles and tracts, by government or by sometimes triangular, and even pentangular. They public opinion; and though a dignified clergyman grow in knots and screws, and indeed in every was occasionally worked up by some subordinates possible contortion to which they may be bent. to publish a denunciation, little or no attention was To break them is impossible. Sometimes they paid to it. Mr. Kidder naturally attributes a hopekill the tree which supports them, and occasionally ful result to his distribution, that, we fear, will not remain standing erect, like a twisted column, after be produced. In some places, the books were evithe trunk which they have strangled has mouldered dently given on chance; for the recipients could within their involutions. Monkeys delight to play not read, and it is by no means clear that the their gambols upon this wild rigging; but they accomplishment was rife in the district. Generare now scarce in the neighborhood of Para. ally speaking, it strikes us, the curiosity was Occasionally their chatter is heard at a distance, literary or critical, or even bibliographical, rather mingled with the shrill cries of birds; but gener- than religious. A spirit more anxiously devout ally a deep stillness prevails, adding grandeur to unquestionably animated some; but these were the native majesty of these forests. persons of a thoughtful turn of mind, or clergymen, and are perhaps to be considered as individual cases. At the same time, a religious reform would offer the best chance for stirring the Brazilian mind, if we could find a Brazilian Luther. The hospitable attentions he personally received, and the amenity of the southern manner, seemed to have impressed Mr. Kidder with a more favorable feeling towards the upper classes of the Brazilians, and indeed towards the people and the prospects of the country in general, than his facts support, or than he himself would maintain as a direct proposition. Except at Rio, where foreign residents and a continual influx of foreigners enforce something like activity and industry, and where the seat of government maintains order, assisted a little by foreign men-of-war, the country appears to be in a state of anarchy or stagnation. Under the first condition there is a species of convulsive energy, the energy of banditti and murderers, which respects neither property nor life, and when subdued by exhaustion or external force leaves behind the decay we have seen at Para. Where quiet prevails, it is rather lassitude than order or repose. "Dolce far niente," or "Pleased let me trifle life away," might be the motto of the Brazilians, as of the genuine Spaniard. Independence has given them the liberty-of doing nothing; which in their fertile soil and genial climate can be managed at the least possible outlay. Rapid decay is overtaking the public buildings and monuments of utility, created by the energy of a Portuguese governor, the power of the church, and the old principle that there exists in the state something higher and greater than the individuals who compose it, or their particular convenience; unless some direct and instant use compels reparation, and even this seems patchingly and insufficiently done. In some closing remarks on the magnificence of the country and the scanty backward state of its population, Mr. Kidder suggests greater encouragement to colonization. With Texas in view the Brazilians might not be very wise to adopt this advice. The Americans of the United States are the only people likely to colonize southern America to any great extent; and to invite them would be to invite the wolf to the door. At present, distance, time, and the barrier of the European Guianas, will save them from annexation but the future state of South America is a curious problem. The religion of the Brazilians, like other parts of the social fabric, seems in a state of decay; and it is quite as problematical whether it will revive. Essentially a religion of forms, these forms are During our author's residence at Rio, a temporal improvement was effected, in the establishment of omnibuses; of which he gives this account, and of Brazilian etiquette. "Nothing like such a means of public conveyance had been before known in any part of the empire. The beautiful coaches constructed for this object were each drawn by four mules, and presented an appearance quite as interesting as that of their prototypes in Broadway. "This was little, however, in comparison with the actual convenience they offered to persons who desired such a means of locomotion. Within these coaches might be witnessed perfect specimens of Brazilian manners. A person accustomed to the distant and care-for-no-one airs which are generally observed in the New York stages, might be a little surprised that so much friendly attention and politeness could prevail among perfect strangers, who might happen to meet each other in these vehicles. It might be equally surprising to see that no one was excluded on account of color. Condition is the test of respectability in Brazil. No slaves can be admitted to an omnibus, except in the single case of a female wet-nurse to some lady, whose child she carries. At the same time, no free person who is decently dressed, and has money to purchase a ticket, is excluded. It is presumed that every respectable person will dress well, not only in fact, but also in form. Hence. none are allowed to go into the public offices, or into the National Museum or Library, who are not dressed in coats. A jacket is the special abhorrence of the Brazilian laws of etiquette; and although more adapted than any other garment to the climate, and generally worn by gentlemen within their own houses, yet it is sternly proscribed abroad; and he that would be respectable must put on a coat whenever he goes out, and if he please, a tolerably heavy coat of cloth." A BRAZILIAN PADRE. "On showing me his library, a very respectable collection of books, he distinguished as his favorite work Calmet's Bible, in French, in twenty-six 66 which volumes. He had no Bible or Testament in Por-present exciting our next-door neighbors, tuguese. I told him I had heard that an edition the constitution of English society is, as medical was about to be published at Rio, with notes and men say, predisposed" to catch. The King of comments, under the patronage and sanction of the Holland, alarmed by the prospect of the potatoarchbishop. This project had been set on foot in crop, has lowered the duties on imported vegetable order to counteract the circulation of the editions provisions; and the Belgian legislature, under of the Bible societies, but was never carried into the pressure of similar apprehensions, has, for a effect. He knew nothing of it. He had heard, time at least, taken them off altogether. And the however, that Bibles in the vulgar tongue had preambles of the royal and legislative ordinances been sent to Rio de Janeiro, as to other parts of which effect these changes expressly recognize the the world, which could be procured gratis, or for a principle that it is the duty of government, by entrifling consideration. Judge of the happy sur-couraging importation, to prevent the food of" the prise with which I heard from his lips, that some most numerous class" from becoming too dear. of these Bibles had already appeared in this neigh- Matters may not look quite so ill with the English borhood, three hundred miles distant from our de-as with the continental potato-crops; but the same pository at Rio. His first remark was, that he did taint is there, and it may next year be propagated not know how much good would come from their by the cuttings. What if Sir Robert Peel were perusal, on account of the bad example of their to catch the philanthropy of the Dutch and Belbishops and priests. I informed him frankly that gian governments, as the universal public of EngI was one of the persons engaged in distributing land once caught the qualified republicanism of these Bibles, and endeavored to explain the mo- Paris? tives of our enterprise, which he seemed to appreciate. "He said, Catholicism was nearly abandoned here, and all the world over. I assured him that I saw abundant proofs of its existence and influence; but he seemed to consider these 'the form without the power.' Our conversation was here interrupted; but having an opportunity to renew it in the evening, I remarked, that knowing me to be a minister of religion, he had reason to suppose I would have more pleasure in conversing on that subject than upon any other. It is true that Sir Robert is not a man of unin termitting movements. He advances by jerks. He is apt to do one thing and then rest on his oars to watch how it works, or to allow people to get accustomed to it, before he ventures on another. He may think that the Maynooth Endowment and the Irish Colleges entitle him to a year's repose. But he may, on the other hand, think that it is better to concede the principle that it is the duty of government to remove obstacles out of the way of food importation, before the people be actually starving-before the concession be ungraciously extorted by meal-mobs and nocturnal drills in the manufacturing districts. What if Sir Robert were next session to deal with the corn-law on the principles professed by the governments of Holland and Belgium? "I then told him, I did not comprehend what he meant by saying that Catholicism was nearly abandoned. He proceeded to explain, that there was scarcely anything of the spirit of religion among either priests or people. He being only a diacono, had the privilege of criticising others. He was strong in the opinion that the laws enjoining clerical celibacy should be abolished, since the clergy were almost all de facto much worse than married, to the infinite scandal of religion; that such was their ignorance, that many of them ought to sit at the feet of their own people, to be instructed in the common doctrines of Christianity; that the spirit of infidelity had been of late rapidly spreading, and infecting the young, to the destruction of that external respect for religion and fear of God which used to be hereditary. Infidel books were common, especially Volney's Ruins. I asked whether things were growing better or worse. Worse,' he replied,' worse continually! What means are taken to render them better?' 'None! We are waiting the interference of Providence.' I told him there were many pious persons who would gladly come to their aid, if it were certain they would be permitted to do the work of the Lord." The book is illustrated by a variety of cuts, some of them buildings, others portraits with a staring wooden kind of likeness. The majority, ernmenthowever, are illustrations of the descriptive letter-Still breathing, but with stamina so steady, press; for which purpose they are highly useful. That all the Israelites are fit to mob its The canoes, rafts, sedans, and many other articles of use, are seen at once; whilst the text instructs the mind in the mechanism. Of this he might be sure-he would have the support of a sect strong in its faith in an untried system, and the opposition of a sect skeptical as to the worn-out system to which it clings from habit and innate distrust of change. The free-traders of all complexions would growl at his offered boon as a watch-dog growls at the bit of meat held out to him by a suspicious-looking stranger; but, like the watch-dog, they would end by gulping it down. The leaders of the League would talk about the principles of eternal justice; the Whig leaders would cry out that Peel was plagiarizing from them; but both would vote for him. On the contrary, the landed interest have now less dread of a state of free trade than of a state of transition; and many among them have of late been practising the art to look corn-law reform in the face, as a thing which, however undesirable, must come. A mortgage or a family-settlement is a serious consideration; but so is the abandonment of all prospect of places and commissions for younger sons and other dependents, by going to opposition against a gov WHAT IF? NATIONAL movements are contagious. The Barricades of Paris gave the first impetus to the reform-bill agitation in England, and the Belgian "Repeal of the Union." New opinions are at Next owner with their double-damned post-obits." So if Sir Robert were next session to undertake the settlement of the corn-law, he would only do what must be done soon-purchase the removal of a possible source of disturbance, at the expense of those taunts about inconsistency which he can now scarcely feel, so accustomed has he grown to them; and make the fortunes of a few New York speculators, who are waiting to do a stroke of business on the repeal of the corn-law, with an |