The relentless curiosity of modern times had not broken in pieces the precious stone, or soiled and torn asunder the flower. Man was the worshipper of the works of God in their simple beauty and grandeur; not the vain inquisitor, eager to learn their structure, that he might prate of what he knew. All was rustic and unforced; "a generous nature was suffered to take her own way to perfection." The cottage seemed a shelter for earth's children, from which they might look out upon, and learn, and love her beauties. They dwelt in the religious twilight of her woods, and mused by her water falls, on the passage of years. The universal puttings forth of spring quickened the pure spirits of the young; and the yellow leaf was the moral companion of the old. All, indeed, was nature without doors and within. Man walked abroad upon the green sod, and sat him down upon rushes by his fireside. The mind was as full of motion, various and creative, as the earth about it; and like hers, its productions were the mere relievings of its fulness, effortless, but plentiful. Its images were not formed in an exactly finished mould, or laboriously chisselled out; but like fairy frostwork, or the wavy sweep of a snow-drift, though ever beautiful, yet always seeming accidental. It was, indeed, the poetic age. Growing up in the absence of a false elegance, and not educated to the cautious. politeness which crowded society has forced upon us, men were left to an independent individuality of character and conduct. Without the excitements of the pleasures and distinctions of the city, the mind spread itself out over the beauties about it; felt and nursed their truth; perceived a fitness and kindly relation in all things; not only gazed upon the lofty works of God, and walked by his still waters in the valley; but looked untired upon the flat and waste, or the long stretch of a rough heath. The taste was not pampered and vitiated by ill assorted prettinesses, turning the unnumbered beauties, the simplicity, and outspread grandeur of this gigantic earth into the huddled and offensively contrasted crowd of a garden; but the rock, fringed and scattered over with its green and silvery moss, was looked upon, though not seated in a bed of roses, violets and pinks; the wholesome perfume of the pine was grateful, and the crisp tread over its fallen and matted leaves, pleasant to the foot.

In this age of improvements, when multiplied inventions have rendered useless many acts to which individuals were once called in the common concerns of life; when one traverses a kingdom, without the touch of its breezes upon his cheek; and now and then takes a hasty peep through his carriage.

window at the scenery about him, as if he were a stranger to it, and would not be unmannerly; we may boast of the facilities and harmless luxuries of the world we live in. But though it gives us facilities, it works into the character a sameness, and an indifference to particulars. Tho object we sought is turned out finished to our hands, wfthout our labor or observation; it is attained without effort, and possessed without delight.

This mechanical moving on of things may aid the politician, but will not benefit the man. To the mathematician, who holds the daily cares and heart-helping relations of life, as so many interruptions to the solution of his problem, it may be pleasant visioning, to suppose himself moved about, without the aid of his troublesome, but faithful breast; and his withindoor concerns carried on by well-ordered machinery, and not self-willed servants; to think that his only perplexities in his domestic establishment, would be the grating of a wheel or breaking of a cord. Not rusty, "like my father's hinge," but well-oiled, how smoothly all would go on! But to the man of heart and poetry, this would be like the house of the dead, where the cold and stiffened bodies of the departed were raised up and charmed into careful and silent motion, acting unknowing, and obeying without sense.

In old times it was not so. Artificial aids were few and uncouth. Worked out in the rough and cumbrous, and requiring strength in the handling, they drew the attention; and lasting long, they became a part of the family, and held their place in the still and kindly-working associations of our homes. The old arm-chair, in the very character of the age, looking so companionable and easy, yet with its comfortable arms protecting its good natured occupier from the too near and familiar approach of his neighbor, stood in the snug corner of the ample fire-place, as by prescriptive right. It was no newfangled thing, bought yesterday because in fashion, and set up for the gibes of the smart auctioneer to-day, because out. It had been adorned by the patient industry and quaint fancy of our mothers, and had the honor of having sustained the weight of our ancestors for a century and more. Putting it away would have been neglecting our fathers, and the unkindly cutting off of remembrances, that had taken root and grown up in the heart. Every piece of furniture had its story to tell, and every room in the antique mansion made the mind serious and busy with the past, and threw a sentiment and feeling, softening but cheerful, over present times. This converse with the inanimate kept the heart warm, and the imagination

quick; their inly workings, various and constant, found much to study every where, and something to love in all things.

The better feelings were kept in motion by the old relations of master and servant; the servant, watchful of the master's wishes, humble in demeanor, yet proud in his fidelity; the master trustful in the other's faith, and careful of his comforts in the reposing time of age. This long tried service brought about a mixed but delightful sensation, when he who had tended us in our playing days, had gone down into the still vale of years, while we stood on the open hill top, in our vigor and prime. It was a kind of filial reverence, touched by the sense of the humble and dependant state of him, whom we protected, and upon whom we looked down.

"But we have bid farewell

To all the virtues of those better days,

And all their honest pleasures. Mansions once
Knew their own masters, and laborious hinds,
Who had survived the father, served the son."

Along with such softening influences there was much of the wild and adventurous starting up in the midst of the common objects of life; at one time throwing over them mysterious shadows, and casting them into strange and awful forms; at another, pouring upon them a dazzling light, in which they flitted gay and fantastic. Surrounded by ideal shapes and untamed nature, the imagination was constantly widening and ever creative. Men could not leave their homes, the proper dwellings of the heart, without travelling into the region of the fancy. Moving on alone through silent and unpeopled paths, winding round dusky rocks, and through tangling brushwood, and overhung by gloomy woods, the traveller held converse with some spirit of the air, or in the superstitious workings of his mind, saw some being of evil, darker than the night that had gathered round him.

Journeying far on foot, the custom of the times, fording rapid streams, toiling over rugged mountains, and through wet lowlands, begat perseverance, healthful spirits, ready, cheerful and self-trusting minds, acquainted with difficulties, and used to subduing them. Their diversions, too, partook of the violent and daring; so that withal there was a combination of the natural and tender, the imaginative and the manly, in the characters of former days, which calls up within us an intense and restless desire to know them entirely, to live back amongst them, to warm us in their cheerful sunshine, to sit by their fireside, listen to their stories, mingle in their domestic games and learn of their stern sense.

This is an exhaustless theme; but I have talked long enough, perhaps too long; for to many it may all seem childish conceit, or the strange imaginings of a tired spirit, impatient of reality. But he, of wide and deep thought, will not so look upon it, nor hold this view of things false because it is sad. Now that every thing rude and irregular is cut down, and all that remains is trimmed up and made to look set and orderly, he will not forget how much there was of exquisite beauty, of loftiness and strength in the one; how tame and unsatisfying is the other. Though there was a deep and subduing tenderness, and ardor and sway and passion in the men of former days, sometimes uncontrolled and not always aimed aright; yet he will see, that with little of softness, man is still weak, and without the extravagance of feeling, still erring. The absence of passion is not always reason, nor coldness judgment.-N. A. Review-1817.

BANK OF THE OHIO, JAN. 27th, 1836.-A Winter Scene.
DIVINE PROTECTION.

I walked along the River-road,

The stream swept by me in its might
The earth seemed wondrous clear and pale
In the broad shadaw of the night.

It was as if the sun for once

Went down, and left the day behind.

But gone the cry of human toil,

And in calm sleep had sunk the wind.

The moon, how cold from heaven she looked!
How still the air her beams came through!
How wide the arch of heaven was grown!
As stars grew bright, how clear its blue!
Loud seemed the voice, when low,

Far went each foot-falls sound,
But hark! what heavy note of wo
Breaks upward from the ground?
It is the River's moan

Far o'er its winding course.

It is the ice-sheet's groan,

As down it goes with headlong force.
But while the moon "looks out so cold,"
Whlle stars still shine with pearly light,
And while the ever troubled tide

Its echoed grief sends far and wide,
Embraced in their great Father's arm,
All gather'd in his ample fold,
My brother men, they sleep how warm!
In the broad shadow of the night.
In summer-heat, in winter-frost.

Thus smiling through we see his face;

In summer-heat, in winter-frost,

May every heart adore his grace.

C. A. D:

TO CONTRIBUTORS AND OTHERS.

It is related, we believe, of the great Scottish enchanter Michael Scott, that he had under his control a demon, who was obliged to work for him, but whom he was obliged likewise to keep always provided with occupation. Having, one day, no particular business on hand, he set the fiend to the task of dividing Eildon hill into three portions. He hoped that this would keep him occupied for a length of time, but it appears that he had underrated his activity, for the very next morning the people who lived near the mountain, saw with astonishment that its summit was rent into the triple peaks which, to this day, give it the form of a papal crown. And again the industrious demon demanded more work of his master. Michael then told him to build a permanent bridge from Ireland to Scotland. Hardly had a day gone by, before a splendid structure united the two countries, the beauty of whose masonry can yet be seen in the portion which remains, called the Giant's causeway. The diligent servant was once more calling for something to do. Michael was almost in despair, when a lucky thought struck him, and he told the fiend to go down to the sea shore, and make him a thousand fathom of cable out of the sand upon the beach. This surpassed even magic art and strength, and it is said that the poor spirit pined away from sheer mortification, and that the marks of his failure yet remain in the great twisted lines of sand, which girdle the shore of that region.

The application of this apologue will be readily understood by our thoughtful friends. We find ourselves in a situation not unlike that of the celebrated enchanter. We have under our control a servant whose power fully equals that of Michael's. The PRESS is such a servant. It can cleave the hills of error, and with lightning stroke rend to their base, mountains of ignorance. It not merely connects adjacent islandsit can bind together remotest continents, bridge oceans, and even throw its wondrous arch over the gulph of time, bringing past centuries into contact with the present, and carrying the present down to the future. For thus are books, in the words of Bulwer, The stately arks, which from the deep Garner the life for worlds to be.

And with their precious burdens, sweep,
Adown dark Time's tumultuous sea.

But even the printing Press cannot make ropes out of sand, a task we shall soon be compelled to set it, if our trusty contributors do not hasten to our relief. For work it will; seventy-two pages of matter every month must it put forth, and on