time-stained walls again, save through the mirage of memory. There is an awe almost as solemn to me in a consciousness like this as that which atte

ell, as I looked my last on the gloomy abode of the La Vignes; but I only said aloud, in answer to the sympathizing glances of one

(so harsh to her ears, usually). "I think she called it the sweetest, too, in sound; but to me it is simply the most sorro

to visit us in our retirement, you and Captain Wentworth," urged Mar

grand thought-one that I saw lately in a Western poem, the New-Year's addres

nt shudder. "Time the 'comforter,' let us say,

oved, my child. All honor to Time, the merciful, whether he builds palaces or tombs! but none the less do I reverence my young poet for

gentle Alice Durand, fired with a ready defiance of all

a good Whig instead-a Cl

r his poetry! It is very natural, for you, Miss Harz," in a somewhat deprecating tone, "t

hich, that from which the marble ball had rolled, to hide in the grass beneath, perchance, until the end of all, I had seen the joyous figure of Walter La Vigne so lightly poised on the occasion of my last exodus from Beauseincourt. A moment'

tor and Pollux. Brothers, like the twins of Leda, they had been bred in the blue-grass region of Kentucky and the vicinity of Ashland, and were worthy of their ancient pedigree, their perfect training an

waited our arrival, and served to swell the cavalcade that wound slowly down the dusty road, with i

gauntleted hand, while he uncovered his head with the ot

z, for a while, and let the y

ttle languid this morning, and I should be poor company. Beside

a poor, sad fellow a word of counsel and cheer. I shall think hard of you if you decline to let me drive you a little way. Beside

lided into the coach in my stead, to take my place and play vis-à-vis to Sylphy, who, as usu

ould speak of her, how much my poor wife liked you. (The time will come when I must not, dare not, you know.) But for circumstances, she wo

could not bear to be outdone in consideration, nor to owe a debt of social gratitude.

aps, 'than is dreamed of in our philosophy'-antagonism a

I replied, vaguely, thinking, Heaven knows, of any thi

his sober reality-sober to-day, at least," he added, with a light laugh. "By-the-way, talking of magnetism, do you know, Miss Harz, I thi

ill not, even for the sake of a syllogism, abuse my own sex; women are never envious e

the beginning, had eyes and ears for no one but yourself, yet I never dreamed th

e, as in happier moments I might

if for sale in Savannah. He has been permeating his brain with the 'Psalms of Life,' that have come out singly in the

randum-book, for a moment,

I have heard it before. He is a Yankee, of course! Now, do you earnestly believe a native of New England, by

f to the contrary

ife, like their wooden nutmegs. They are perfect Chinese for ingenuity and imitation, and the resemblance to th

y, Willis, was not also 'to the manner born?' Read 'Thanatopsis,' or are you acq

egiously, when he attempted to 'gild refined gold and paint the lily,' as he did in his so-called 'Sacred Poems.' He can sp

the truth of what my copy-book told me long ago, that 'evil association corrupts good manners,' or I will va

y remark, "with his dreary hurdy-gurdy to cap the climax. Heavens! what a nasal twang the who

ou have caught up from some malignant British review, and, like all other serpents, you are venomous in proportion t

are all making such a work over-fine-sounding thing enough, I grant you, ingenious rhyme, and all that. But I know where the framework came from! Old Drayton f

avraud! In power of thought, beauty of expression, what comparison is t

comes to the 'God-fire,' as an old German teacher of mine used to say, our simple Southern poets leave them all behind-'Beat them all hollow,' would

in the poems of Walter Scott! Byron was a poet in spite of his condition, not because of it. Hear Barry Cornwall-how he stirs the blood! What trumpet like to Campbell! What mortal voice like to Shelley's? the hybrid angel! What full orchestra surpassed Coleridge for harmony and b

eloped song that shall yet exonerate America from the charge of poverty of genius, brought by the haughty Briton! Yes, we will sing yet a mightier strain than has ever been poured since the time of Shakespeare! and in that g

h to vent his excitement, and, setting his small white teeth sternly, with an

Harz," he continued, a moment later, "and only by the finge

eciting somewhat deri

trumpet, b

nce, we com

time when I thought these two lines the most soul-stirring i

y's to begin with;" and, without waiting for permission, he recited the beautiful "Pledge," with which all readers a

is cup to

elines

of her g

ming pa

e end with eloqu

on the rose; the bloom on the grape! Nothing wanting that constitutes the indefinable div

ly, scarce know

ar, sonorous accents as he declaimed, a little too s

s upon my

is figur

eyes his ar

ers are-

vraud, mostly of the days of Charles II., of Rochester

elf perchance in the old Greek time; and which, despite my perverse intentions, stirred me as if I had quaffed a draught of pink champagne. Is

cheek the

es comes

hued Aur

he pola

insect-bi

ted flowe

e snowy sw

s in wat

s are mirrore

ds on the

motion i

rd a me

at all humbled by conviction, though a little annoyed at the pointed manner

at fair and

rer, dost

I only s

ss think

ogical in my poetry, and take it in strata. But I am more generous to your Southern bard than you are to our glorious Longfellow! I don't cal

s! With all his nerve and vim, he died of melancholy, I believe. As good an end as any, howeve

is one that

red laid

hearts that

e man of

a pretty little thing called 'How shall I woo her?'" glancing archly and somewhat impertinently at me, I thought-or, perhaps, what would simply have amused me in another man and m

f anguish! How I wished that influence of mine could prevail to induce him to divide his dual nature, "To throw away the wor

ceived, by my manner. "I have a fancy for the title, nevertheless, not having heard any

nly, that angels might not hear approvingl

please your driver, and reward his care. See how skillfully I avoided that f

effect of the poem he solicited, I could not be accused of want of consideration

nted with this little gem, I venture to give it here-exquisite, passionate

I woo her?

er when

er fine and

the quiver

tell her I

eet her s

re every wh

than so

I woo her?

nd silen

e eyes whose

e in eve

tell her eye

ght her ow

a deeper sp

in my

Favraud, I counsel you," I interpola

in, so that the grating of the wheels among the stems of the scarlet lychnis, that grew in immense patches

en;" and I continu

I woo her?

ms of ol

earth, and

in prose

tell her,

in oth

half so

t speak-fo

r, that harp of a thousand strings, the wondrous human heart! And I again pursued, in suppressed ton

I woo her?

the hol

prayer, and

her lips t

l her, whe

on's thril

ory to m

far than

letely; a verse which I rendered with all the pathos of whic

y! the chor

is rent

wake the

its lin

I know, is

rjury is

at lose what

they lef

ve motion, and covered his face with his hands. Groans burst from his murmuring lips, and the great deeps of sorrow gave up their se

o say, no consolation to offer. Nay, after consideration, rather did I glory in his grief, which redeemed his nature in my estimation, though grieved in tur

e, and resuming his reins without apology fo

e, you do not deride me! You know how perfect, how spiritual she was! You loved her well-I saw it in your eyes, your manner-and for that, if nothing else, you have my heart-felt gratitude. So few appreciated her unearthly purity.

y! the chor

is rent i

weariness, and bitterness, the meaning of that terrible word-alone! Eternal solitude. The Robinson Crusoe of

may come a time of reaction." I hesitated.

to cheat himself back into gayety and the interests of life. I have sisters, but they are not like you. I wish to Heaven they were! There is not a woman in the world on whom I have any claims-on whose shoulder I can lean my head and take a hearty cry. And what are men at such a season? Mocking fiends, usually, the bes

like yours, Major Favraud, the road to distinction will soo

ng fox! Something of an epicurean, too, in his high estate. What grim old Jackson left half heale

in the eyes of all reasonable men. I shook my head. "Thank God! all that is over," I said, gravely, fe

will, Miss Harz, as surely as there is a sun in the heavens! 'and may I

s, already helmed and plumed for the harvest, and plantations green with thrifty cotton-plants, with their half-formed bolls, promising suc

d with a growth of black-jack and yellow-pine to the summit. Here was a ferry with its Charon-like boat, of the primitive sort-flat barge, poled o

oak trees and small trim parterre, gay at this season with various annual flowers, scarce worth the cultivation, one would think, in that land of gorgeous perennial bloom. But Queen Margarets, ragged robin

ll of certain former lofty lodgings across the sea, perhaps, situated in the heart of some great city, and overlooking roofs and court-yards-t

rlwind with her child and husband to embark for America. At the point of embarcation-like Evangeline-the husband and wife had been separated accidentally, and on her arrival in a strange land she found herself alone and penniless with her son, scarce six years old. Her husband had been carried to a Southern port, she learned by the merest chance, and, dis

gia. Reaching her destination after a long and painful journey and delays of many kinds, she found her husband living in a log-hut

at the time I saw her, as those living were separated from her at that period), reared and educated them herself, toiled for and with them, late and early, strained every nerve in the arduous

ore recently white frame wings had been attached, projecting a few feet in front of the primitive building, and connected thereto by a shed-roofed gallery, which embraced t

out stooping, a wild multiflora rose, then in full flower, was artistically trained so as to present a

ith river-pebbles and shells, and bordered by box, trimly clipped and kept low, and the two br

nce, indeed, the question of sex would have arisen, and been found difficult to decide. Her attire seemed that of a friar, even to the small scalloped cape that scantily covered her shoulders, and the coarse black serge, of which her strait

d in the neck, and divided at one side in true manly fashion. It was brushed well back from her expansive, fair, and unwrinkled forehead, b

elrose Abbey" occurred to me, as I ga

y on the knig

eyes gleamed

cane, above which she stooped slightly, her aged and somewhat severe, but serene face

y be remembered, she had so irreverently likened her master on one occasion; bursting forth, as it saw us coming, in

avraud; "there's your quotation well applied thi

aud's salutation and introduction, waved us in and across her threshold. As for Major Favraud, he had turned to leave us on the door-sill, to see to the comfort and safety of his horses;

queen, or the log-hut of a wayside i

is no curiosity, no novelty to me, I have stopped here so frequen

rtesy to enter, smiling and pointing forward silently as she did so, and then, like Major Favraud, she turned and abandoned us at the

of the ship of state, should its keel grate too closely on that adamantine wall. 'L'état c'est moi,' said Louis XIV., and that 'slavery is the South' is as

er gentlemen, was the speaker of these remarkable words, which embraced the whole genius and policy of the South as it then existed, a

presence of one of the anointed princes

settle, or rather sofa, in one corner of the room, gazing admiringly, as I spoke, on the tall,

his companions either," she replied; "un

of them!-but that man himself-the speaker-h

one moment the splendor of his large dark eyes, in their iron framing, met my own, then passed recognizingly on to rest on the face

nger between his own and pressed it to his heart. (To his lips, I think, he would fain have lifted it, falling on one knee, perchan

started to his eyes and choked his utterance. Thus was my conject

after this fervent greeting,

friends in this vicinity sustained me there. I have been discussing the great

necessity," was the faltering reply, "or I shou

, I have never had the pleasure of meeting Madame Favraud," advancing, as he spoke, toward me, with

ng as he spoke. "These ladies are friends of mine-one, a distant relative"-he hesitated-"within the las

mirable opportunity for observing the personnel of the great Southern leader, during the brief space of time accorded by the change of stage-horses. For, with his friends, he was then en route for another appointment. He was canvassing the State, with a view to a

ble characteristics. It was truly an iron-bound face, condensed, powerful in every nerve, muscle, and lineament, and fraught, beyond almost all others, with intellect an

soothing and condoling with him (I could not doubt, from the expression of his speaking countenance), I see him still i

, Darius, Pericles, Napoleon, were thus magnetically gifted. I recall few instances of others so distinguished in station who possessed this p

the stage-horn was the signal for Mr. Calhoun's departure, and I never

bt, contributed to train his character to energy and strengthen his physique to endure its brain-burden. I heard with pleasure the account of one who had passed much of his youth beneath his roof, and who, however enthusiastic, was, in the very framing of his

h. Yet he never refused, on any occasion, to answer with minuteness the inquiries of the smallest child or most insignificant dependant. 'Had he not been Alexander, he must have been Parmenio.' Had fortune not struck out for him the pa

e music-poet

is own-his opinions all genuine. He is, indeed, a man of very varied attainment, as well as great grasp of intellect.

its floor freshly scoured and sanded, while a simple deal stand in the centre bore a vase filled with the rarest and most exquisite wild-flowers I had ever seen (from the gorgeous amaryllis and hibiscus of these regions, down to wax-like blosso

to a long, low apartment in the rear of the dwelling, where a table was spread for our party, with a damask cloth and napkins, decorated china and cut-glass, that proved Madame Grambeau's personal supe

at him. "Your familiarity needs to be checked." Her manner of grave and kindly irony removed all impression of rebuke from this speech, which Major Favraud received very coolly, spoiled child that he really was, rubbing his hands as he took the foot of the tab

to me. "Miss Harz, you never tasted any thing before like madame's soup and sauces. I wish she would take me in partnership

y materials, and realize the old proverb that 'the devil sends cooks.' But go to work like a good fellow, and carve the dish before you;

ting a cover before him and peeping in, then returnin

young men, at least, think every old, toothless gray

d Dr. Durand, attacking the dish, wit

Favraud? It is one of the few English words I do not know-or for

time you were beginning to master our language. You know

ly than any foreigner I have ever known," I

idiomatic, and bearing about it the idiosyncrasy of the language from which it was derived. She was evidently a person of culture and n

, and to preside over the councils of statesmen, and (to rise in climax) the drawing-room of the grande monde. But it wa

bered to have seen the head of the Princess Lamballe borne on a pole through the streets of Paris, was no

ost, still influenced his mother, in her refusal to live under his

General Curzon, in his bank at Savannah, wherewith to meet emergencies; while these things last, I will owe to no man

a little three-cornered library, she had a goodly store in the

intervals-one of Madame Sand's novels, "Les Mauprats," I remember, a singular and powerful romance, then recently issued, whose root I ha

f, and she agreed, with me, that the coincidence of genius furnished many su

toward its close, and Marion begged permission to have her basket of cakes and fruits brought in for d

meats, well prepared, with such vegetables as the Lord lets grow in this po

occasionally-eh, madame?" adde

derately. But I buy none such. I drown not, Clarence-like, even in butts of malmsey, my hard-earned go

to General Finistere's-the snuffbox tapping, I mean. The oracle is beginning

of age. I have some of the best, and will send you down a demijohn, if you say the

I hope. No? I regret so, for her own sake; but your brandy I reject, Victor; remember

ever before-thus watered, or wined, I mean.-Just think of it, Miss Harz! To pour good wine round the roots of a Fontainebleau grape

h. Of such stuff was made not the fathers of your Revolution. But stay, there is an explanation due to me, yet unrendered," she

ion into another channel for some reasons. "I had thought you an expatriated

ce. When the dregs of the bas peuple rose to the surface of the revolution, commenced by the sound middle classes, we regarded the scum of aristocracy as the smaller of the two evils. As

ippantly, I fear, "and will to the end, no doubt; for, in its very organization, our c

(the companion of her whole married life, as she acquainted us), she inhaled it with an air of meditative self-complacency, then offered it quiet

p his nostrils, as one takes a spoonful of unpleasant medicine. Then contradicting his own assertion immediately afterward, he succeeded in expelli

expense of the penitent Favraud, to whom Dr. Durand repeated the tantalizing saying, that "it is a royal privilege to take

on, as it seemed-Madame Grambeau sat silently, with what memories of the past and what insight

spoken, and the attention of her hearers undiverted by divers absurdities-among others the affected gambols

ere sown, whose harvest is not yet produced. Mr. Calhoun, with his prophetic eye, foresees that this crop of armed men is inevitable from such

uffbox, tapping it peremptorily before opening it,

phets for ill-of which some few have been God-appointed, and the sayings of such alone have been preserved. Th

ght, and resolution, and intellect-gifted as beseems their vocation, masterful and he

ncy Adams, General Jackson himself, in su

to do, I suppose, mademoiselle; but they are accessories merely o

, nodding to me as he spoke, and lending the next moment implicit attention to what Madame Grambeau was saying; for the br

dice and party, wherewith it seeks to blind its kingly vision, and descries the horrors beyond as the result of the acts he is now committing; and when such moments of clear conviction come to him, the ambitious tool of a party, I envy not his sensations," and she shook her head mou

lasped, her whole face and manner uplifted, as if, indeed, on her

r seasons-he, too, foresees the coming of our doom! His clear vision embraces anarchy, dissension, civil war, with all its attendant horrors, as the consequence of man's injustice; and, like Moses, he beholds the promised land into which he can never enter! Would that it were given to him to appoint his Joshua, or eve

mand!" said Major Favraud, asi

madame, your words point to results too terrible-too unnatural, it seems to me

t; and the wars of Scylla, of the Jews themselves, shall be outdone in the horror and persistence of that strife of partners-I will not say brothers-for there is

dent with those of the South. His hope of the presidency itself vests in his constituents, and the wand would be broken in his hand were he to lend himself to partiali

commerce, far more than the work of the husbandman. We are an agricultural people, we of the South and West-and especially we Southerners, with our poverty of invention, our one staple, our otherwise helpless habits, incident to the institution which, however it may be our curse, is still our wealth, and to which, for the present time, we are bound, Ixion-like, by every law of necessity. What doe

ates, have sold to the Egyptians, as a bond-slave. But they shall yet come to drink of his cup, and eat of his bread of opinion, in the famine of their Canaan. Nullification shall leave a fitting successor, as Philip of Macedon left Alexander to carry out his plans. The abolitionist and the slave-holder are as distinct as were Charles I. and Cromwell, or Catharine de Medicis and Henry of Navarre. The germ that Calhoun has planted shall lie long in the earth, perhaps, but when it breaks the s

lowly through my veins as I followed her in thought across the waste of woe and desolation. For there was something in her manner, her voice (august and solemn

n your youth still cast their dark shadows over the coming years, and so deceive you into prophecies that it is sad to hear f

she mu

aud. "What is a conservative, after all, but a social parrot, who repeats 'wise saws and modern instances,' until he believe

utside, how he is going on, Favraud, à propos of poll parrots, you know, as

n to lead the way to the portico, where swung the cage of the jolly bird in question; and, headed by Madame Grambeau leaning on her cane, we foll

shrieked the parrot, as we st

g the matter, cert

ted many times, laughing loudly,

timidly; "only look at its black to

ge lady?" said Madame Grambeau, addressing her bird by

as the whimsical rejoinder. "Jackson! g

ace on that hill," signifying the site of the duel with her slender cane. "It was there they fought their duel, à l'outrance, and I knew it not until too late! His

y the aged lady, however, at the moment, but not without amusing

g reprovingly around. "Indeed, he is the only American I have ever seen who possessed

n"-"Yarns and Yankees"-"Shad and shin-plasters"-"Yams and yaller boys," and so on, in a string of the most irrelevant alliteration and folly, that, like much othe

his discourse was discreet. He knew many wise proverbs and polite salutations in French and English both, most of which he has discard

nized signal, a part of past instructions probably, the parrot burst forth at once in a series of the most grotesque and outré oaths ear

istis dea

me her ol

arge up in de

m Yankee Ph

n jour," or "Bienvenu, compatr

said. "Many parrots have I seen, but never one like thi

er, drill, and go through all the military motions. I could do it easily, and so repair my broken fortunes. I have one already at home that feigns death at the word of command. I have amused myself for hours at a time with this bird.-Don't say a word, Miss Harz," speaking low, "I see what you

ed, "only under a cloud, sti

the promise common to all mankind;" and t

dame La Vigne's, who received us cordially, enter

cool shelter and warm welcome at once under the roof of General Curzon, the South's most polished gentleman and finishe

TNO

2

e author are represented through the extremist Favraud. To her

3

ta

4

e who have seen good copies of this work, executed for and by the order of Louis Philippe,

spoken that Healey succeeded better with the portrait of Mr. Ca

5

is famous anti-tariff crusade throughout the l