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against the Puritans, yet the band of Leonidas was not more determined on victory or death. "It is the will of God that we should be tried," continued the governor; "if our faith faint not, the crown of victory, either of life or death, will be ours." There was not a pale cheek or lip among the men, nor a tear seen, or a cry heard among the women and children. That Providence would direct the issue for their best good, all believed, trusted; and when they discovered those they had mistaken for Dunkirkers were indeed their own countrymen, the good Providence that had sent the trial, and yet shielded them from injury, was still more apparent. And it was thus every event that marked their passage to America was interpreted.

Did fair weather and fair winds prevail?-how providentially it was ordered that they might have a quick voyage when so much depended on their. arrival early in the season! If they were retarded by storms and contrary gales, God had seen that it was good for them to be afflicted; and by a dispensation of his Providence was testing their patience and submission.

And thus, when Governor Winthrop had, from Mr. Johnson and his wife, learned the particulars of Oliver Temple's history, did he discover, in every misfortune which had befallen that young man, some particular bearing on his future destiny, on the part which Providence was fitting him to perform. And he felt persuaded that Oliver was to become a distinguished Christian, a shining light in that sanctuary from persecution, that pure church, which was to be founded in America. Yet the governor was not a visionary; he calculated with the shrewdness of worldly prudence when worldly things were under discussion; and he calculated that Oliver Temple would be a more active, and consequently a more useful man, could he be aroused from the torpor of sorrow which seemed to benumb his faculties, and was evidently preying fast on his health. But the sagacious governor did not trust to arguments merely to effect his purpose. He knew that words were never more idly used than in endeavors to combat by reasoning the indulgence of those griefs which the mourner's heart has consecrated as sacred. But he calculated that, if he could interest the young man's affections, those sensibilities which bind the human heart in fellowship with its kind, he would soon appear soberly cheerful as became his age and character.

The governor communicated his views and feelings on the subject to the Lady Arabella and her husband. They both agreed it would be judicious.

"If it is practicable," said the governor, "what do you think of promoting a match between this young man and your friend Lucy Perry?"

The lady smiled with that kind of meaning which argued satisfaction.

"I have marked her modest deportment and pious attention to religious duties with much approbation,"

continued the governor, "and I own I have felt that the young lady must make a great sacrifice of inclination to duty in going thus solitary to a strange land. I know she has excellent and dear friends in your ladyship and Mr. Johnson, but still I do think a kind protector, one of our strong and firm sex, is peculiarly necessary for the support of a delicate woman who ventures to be a sojourner in the wilderness."

The Lady Arabella looked on her husband with that expression of trusting love that told on whom she depended; the smile that answered her appeal spoke how fondly her confidence was appreciated. The governor raised his handkerchief, as if clearing his eye of some mote that pained him, but the pain was at his heart; for at that moment the thoughts of his own wife, whom he had left, perhaps never to be united again, rushed so tumultuously on his mind, that, firm as he was, it unmanned him, and he strove to conceal the tears he could not restrain. "I think Lucy Perry will make an excellent wife," observed Mr. Johnson.

"And I have no doubt Oliver Temple will be a kind husband," said the Lady Arabella.

"I believe their meeting thus together on board the vessel was providential; and that we shall be in the way of duty to endeavor to promote a marriage between them," said the governor.

So the affair was settled, and, though nothing like a modern match-making was undertaken by the governor or his coadjutors in the plan, yet they contrived sometimes to bring the young people together, either to join in singing a particular tune in which it had been remarked their voices harmonized wonderfully, or else Lucy sat by the Lady Arabella as a listener, while Oliver was persuaded to read a chapter in "Precious Consolations for Weary Souls," or some other of those quaint and devout books that formed the light reading of our ancestors.

Day after day thus passed, and though Oliver Temple had paid no more attention to Lucy than the ceremonious civility of those days, which was most conspicuous in the frequency and flexibility of the bows of a gentleman, required, yet the governor was firmly persuaded of the success of his scheme. He conferred with the Rev. Mr. Wilson respecting it, and his approval seemed still further to stamp it as designed by Providence. And Zechariah Long's opinion was a coincidence that appeared almost miraculous, or at least prophetic.

The governor had thought it his duty to confer with that somewhat stern and peculiar, but yet esteemed and pious man, concerning Oliver. He found the suspicions of Zechariah were first awakened by hearing Oliver sigh and groan repeatedly in his sleep, as if his mind was burdened, and then he overheard him one day lamenting, in bitter terms, to the Lady Arabella, for the death of some person. "And so," said Zechariah, "I found his sorrow was for the decease of some one, and I thought it could

not be a relation, as he was not clothed in mourning garments, and he had come on board privately, and no person knew him save Mr. Johnson and his lady, and so I inferred that he was a son of some of their friends, and that he had in a quarrel-such things happen among the children of this world, and are called honorable-slain a man, a friend perhaps, especially as I thought he showed guilt with his grief."

"You judged hardly," said the governor.

"I do repent me of it, since you have told me his history. And I wish we could devise something whereby the sadness of his countenance might be changed."

"I can join in your wish," said the governor. Zechariah raised his finger twice before he spoke; as if the weight of his subject required deliberate pondering, then he came close to the governor, and said, in what he meant for a whisper-it might have been heard three paces—

"I have a thought; if it may be spoken, governor, to you I will say it. Would it not be well if the young man should find among us a companion who would comfort him for the loss of his first love? There is Lucy Perry; the maiden is comely, and seems heavenly-minded."

Zechariah paused, fearing he had said too much on so worldly a subject; but the smile of the other reassured him.

"If such is the will of Providence, it would exceedingly rejoice me," replied the governor.

And from that time he felt assured it would be the will of Providence, and even spoke confidently to the Rev. Mr. Wilson respecting the marriage which he might hold himself ready to solemnize.

Their long voyage at length drew to a close.

The cold winds of spring, that hitherto had chilled the passengers, were exchanged for the warm breath of a summer gale laden with the perfume of fruit and flower, as if to welcome them to the shore where such treasures of the earth abounded. It was the season when the approach to our then wild country was the most inviting. The forest foliage was sufficiently expanded to conceal the rudeness and desolation that a leafless mass of trees presents; and it had not that dense, dark aspect which, in its full maturity and verdure, made it look frowning and almost impenetrable. Some of the wild trees, the dogwood in particular, were in bloom, and their blossoms contrasted beautifully with the bright green of the young leaves, thus softening the majesty of the scene. They had been for more than two months confined on board a crowded ship, and the idea of liberty to range abroad on the shore before them was of itself sufficient to bring rapturous exclamations from almost every tongue. But there were higher and holier considerations that called for rejoicing. They had been preserved amid the perils

of the deep; the land they had sought as their place of rest was reached, their home!

"There, my Arabella, must be our home; can you be contented to dwell there?" said Mr. Johnson to his wife, as he pointed to the sea of forest that stretched in the distance, far as the eye could pene

trate.

The tear that was gathering in her dark eyes did not fall, it only brightened their expression, as she met her husband's gaze, and calmly replied, "It will be home to me wherever you dwell, my husband."

"I wish the young man had better improved the opportunity that so providentially placed him in her society. But we must be content. It is, however, impressed on my mind that you will shortly be called to bless his nuptials," said Governor Winthrop to Mr. Wilson. They were both regarding Oliver Temple, who seemed, as he stood gazing on the shore, so rapt in the contemplation of the new and strange scene before him, that he was totally unmindful of the questions and exclamations his companions were pouring forth, as a boat from the harbor approached the vessel. Mr. Endicott and some others were in the boat.

"Welcome, welcome to Salem," was the greeting. Oliver did not regard it. His eye was caught by a young man who remained in the boat; the cry of "Robert Welden! is it you?" burst in a shriek from his lips; and the next moment they were in each other's arms.

Robert and Rebecca had escaped. The tale of their death was an invention of Oliver Temple's father, to efface, as he hoped effectually, the romantic dream of his son, that he should ever obtain the sister.

"How providential it was that this young man and Lucy Perry did not fall in love!" said the governor to Mr. Johnson a few days after they had landed. "We may see by this how easy it is for the wisdom of man to be turned into foolishness. I thought I had laid a mighty prudent plan; but lo! I now see my folly. We must submit ourselves and all that we have to God. He will in his good providence order events for our best happiness."

When the fleet, that brought over the colonists, had all arrived safely, a day of thanksgiving was appointed. This was July 8th, 1630, and on that day of rejoicing Oliver Temple and Rebecca Welden were married.

This was the first wedding celebrated in the colony that laid the foundation of Boston. There was great joy and many congratulations, and none of the guests appeared more disposed to kindly feelings on the occasion than Mr. Zechariah Long. His suspicions were all removed, and he stood so erect that his superior altitude was never afterwards a matter of question.

"How beautifully everything is ordered by Providence!" said the governor.

VEGETABLE PHYSIOLOGY

BY HARLAND COULTAS.

WHEN we examine the various plants around us, and notice their phenomena, we at once see that all are subject to certain fixed and immutable laws, which operate with as much constancy and regularity as the laws governing the motions of the ponderous worlds that roll in the depths of space.

Thus all plants have a definite period of life assigned them, more or less limited, during which time we see them, as it were by successive increments, slowly elaborated out of the earth and atmosphere, arrive at the full perfection of their growth and beauty, reproduce themselves, and then die. With the cessation of life plants become disorganized or chemically decomposed, decay, and disappear, the materials out of which their fabric was constructed being reunited unto other bodies by the influence of that mutual attraction which subsists not only between worlds, but amongst atomic particles of matter, however small.

The law of material attraction may be thus expressed: Matter may attract matter at all distances, from zero to infinity. This attraction takes place with a force varying directly in proportion to its quantity and inversely as the square of the distance. Now when matter collects into masses, as we see it has done in the case of the starry heavens and planetary bodies, the bodies thus mutually attracting each other separate sometimes to distances all but infinite, but according to fixed and determinate laws which may be calculated by the higher mathematics, the distance increasing in the ratio of their respective magnitudes. We call the name of this species of attraction gravity. But when matter retains its elementary condition and exists in the form of those invisible particles called atoms, two or more mutually attracting particles must be brought by the same law infinitely near to each other before they can exercise any mutual influence; and we give the name of chemical affinity to this kind of attraction.

To apply this philosophy to plants. They are the result principally of the atomic or chemical affinity, combined with other agents, and are a beautiful pile of matter borrowed from the atoms in the earth and air, and united together by the operation of natural laws for a little space of time. Fabricated by nature as material for the building up of higher organic forms, they perform their part in the ever-shifting scenery of life. Some of them become incorporated as food into animal bodies; others retain their state as plants, and are the instruments used by nature to extract fertilizing principles from every falling shower and passing breeze, which they impart to the

soil on which they finally decay. The end of being accomplished, these beautiful and evanescent forms decay, they become disorganized, the pile of matter falls, and is restored by the influence of secret, invisible affinities to the air and earth from which it was borrowed for a little while.

The period of time during which these phenomena take place varies according to the peculiar organization of each species. Thus plants whose organization is very simple, as ferns, mosses, and many of our flowering plants, come to perfection, reproduce themselves, and then die, and this all in a single season. In those, however, whose organization is higher, the duration of life is proportionably longer. But the forest tree, lifting its massive stem for centuries to the light of day, has an appointed period to its life as regular as the lowly moss that grows beneath its shade. The duration of these phenomena is alone different. The phenomena themselves are precisely analogous. The growth of the humble moss with its beautiful little reproductive mechanism is only a simpler expression of the same law which operates in the production of the forest tree. A few months, however, suffice to perfect the one, whilst many centuries are required by nature before she can build up the other. It would seem from this that the study of the simple plants ought to take precedence of those whose structure is more complex and intricate. It is these plants which first clothe the surface of the barren rock. They are the first settlers on those new lands which, after unnumbered ages, according to geologists, rise from their parent Successive generations of these plants die, and form by their decay a humus for the growth and nutrition of higher plants.

waves.

We will take nature for our guide. We will follow the footsteps of her successive creations. We are satisfied that the plan and structure of her higher organizations may be successfully studied in detail in the humbler. Let us begin at the beginning. How can we possibly comprehend what is intricate when we stumble at what is simple? It is a philosophical as well as scriptural truth that "all flesh is as grass." We depend on plants for the materials of our own growth; the development of our own being is closely connected with that of the vegetable world; and, if we know nothing of wild flowers, how is it possible that we should know anything properly of ourselves? The highly organized body of man can never be thoroughly understood unless the whole series of forms of life beneath him engages his attention.

ARISTOCRACY.

THE world has been frequently entertained with descriptions given of the manners of the great, by fortunate individuals who, with the help of "letters of introduction," and the practice of suave obsequiousness, have climbed to the "summits of refinement" in Europe, and in wondering admiration have surveyed, from the height, the world of "white Kiddom" around them. Intoxicated perhaps by the "thin air" which pervades those regions, their descriptions of the aristocracy have become tinctured with a kind of servile amazement-an envious idolatry-which will provoke the quiet contempt of wise men, and excite wonder and imitation in the foolish. A young tourist-fresh from a republican countryvisiting for the first time the land of his ancestors, and mingling with the noble and the high-born, is apt to be dazzled by the glare that surrounds him, and to forget that tinsel glitters as brightly as pure gold.

He cannot perceive in a match-making countess the practice of arts which, when stripped of their fashionable cloak, a green-grocer's wife would spurn-nor detect under the bland smile of conventional coldness, a wreck of good feeling, a blight of genuine nature, and a frigid selfishness, that are too often to be found in their withering perfection among these envied classes.

We listen to his excited narrative-some with delight and others with charitable patience. In perfect good faith he assures us how that, one fine morning, he sat with Lady X. in her ladyship's boudoir; how that her ladyship was attended by a sky-blue page who handed her a scented note on a silver salver-he becomes learned in millinery, and minutely describes her ladyship's dress, and informs us that in the important tête à tête he enjoyed with her ladyship, she said that "she was fond of Americans." To all this we attend with laudable gravity; we bless the penetration of our tourist, and Lady X. is immortalized in our thoughts.

Lady X. does not tell him that she is voted a bore by the clique at Almacks-that her life is spent in petty intrigues-that her expenditure exceeds her income, and she condescends to be mighty humble to plebeian creditors, and coax French milliners with fashionable scandal. We have seen gentlemen of this kind who have left home, plain citizens and good men, and, during their sojourn in Europe, have merged manhood in fashion, and native goodness in second-hand foppery; drowned nature in fastidiousness, and sacrificed nationality to puerile imitations of foreign follies.

There is an aristocracy of the country as well as the town, and in this paper the writer will endeavor VOL. XLV.-3

to portray the manners of the class in their rustication, both of those whose permanent residence is in the country, and those votaries of fashion who visit it during the interregnum of the London "season."

The residences of these great people in England are in the vicinity of small country towns, in which no manufacture is carried on, and whose inhabitants are supported in fact by their trading with them. Their houses embrace every style of architecture, from the modern mansion with its three or four hundred acres of land, to the old turreted castle, embosomed in its wide domain of hill and dale, woods and lawns. These establishments during the greater part of the year present a dull and desolate appearance. An over-fed butler with a pompous housekeeper exercise a despotic viceroyalty over a troup of inferior domestics. The coach-houses and adjacent offices are hermetically locked, and no signs of life are visible except among grooms "breathing" the horses, or a dozen dogs leaping to the extreme length of their chains from their kennels, to fright an intruding stranger with their aristocratic yelping. The mantle of command descends at these intervals from the proprietor to the butler, who makes the most of such opportunities to impress the lower servants and the towns-people with an immense idea of his importance. The dreariness infects the towns, and the shopkeepers grumble away their mouths in deploring the badness of trade, and the degeneracy of things in general.

But a change comes o'er the spirit of the scene in September and October, when parliament is prerogued and "all the world" flies into the country to slaughter domesticated game, and destroy hecatombs of tame hares in fashionable batteus. The Marquis of A., an old peer whose park wall bounds the town on one side, whose trees pry into the windows of some of the houses, and whose rooks keep up an eternal clamor above the streets, returns from his arduous parliamentary duties of dining at his club, and sleeping his dinner off in the House of Lords, to the halls of his ancestors. He is accompanied by his two sons, the Earl of B. and Lord Frederick C., his right honorable daughters the Ladies C., and a highbred gout, of very ancient pedigree, yet lively withal, aristocratic, imperious, and yet painfully eccentric.

The Marquis's arrival is soon followed by that of other noblemen and gentry who reside from two to seven miles around; and the dosing townsmen, whose respect for rank is hereditary and extreme, shake hands with each other in fervid congratulation, and invite the servants of the establishments (who have profitable patronage to bestow) to snug evening

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parties in the taverns, where they make laborious speeches and drink solemn toasts. The quiet streets are distracted with mounted horsemen in gaudy liveries, who are dispatched for perfumeries for ladies-maids, and physic for horses, fish-sauces for the cook, and boluses for his Lordship's gout, letters and lozenges for her Ladyship, and dog-lashes and horsegirths for the stables.

The Marquis (who may be taken as a sample of the whole tribe) is invisible for a few days, and the townsmen shake their sagacious heads and propagate dim rumors among themselves, that "it's the gout," or that "there's a screw loose up at the Hall," "things have not all gone right in his absence," and such like, while he, good gentleman, is overhauling the accounts of his steward, learning of defaulters in rent, or prosecutions for poaching. The young sprigs of nobility are examining the shrubbery and gardens, listening to the feats performed by one or two favorite thoroughbreds, or trying the scent and training of a few young pointers. After business is attended to, and a few days immurement in the hall has proved a bore, the different members of the noble family begin to emerge from their splendid solitude, to make morning calls upon the surrounding gentry, and condescend even to 66 go a shopping" on fine mornings.

The reader has perhaps some crude notion of shopping, but I doubt if he (or she rather) have any just idea of the mysteries of that important science, as practised by these classes. Let us suppose an elegant barouche of a light-brown color, pricked out with dark-green, with a full-grown coat of arms surmounted with a coronet upon the panel. To this vehicle are attached four "bright bays,"each seventeen hands high, glittering in silver-mounted harness, arching their shining necks and snorting in contemptuous pride as they spurn the ground. These animals are managed by two boys (one boy to each pair) of fourteen years old, clothed in small tight green jackets buttoned up to the chin, and displaying in front three rows of round gilt buttons, two of which pass over their shoulders and penetrate a short distance down their backs; they have faultless white gloves and silver-handled whips, their legs are bound in stainless breeches and Lilliputian top boots, and their business is to look straight before them without moving a muscle of their necks, and rise and fall at the same moment in their saddles, with the undeviating regularity with which infantry soldiers, on their own horses, "keep step." At the back of the carriage is a tall human being, who has cheated Nature by forsaking the sphere of usefulness for which he was sent upon earth, and voluntarily torturing himself into that biped anomaly-a footman, or flunkey-there is some excuse for a bear that is compelled to learn the art of dancing, but no apology can be formed for a rational animal, who submits of his own free will to the tricks of lackeyism. This gentleman is superb in flaming livery and

shoulder-knot, and sublime in white silk stockings, into which he has inserted two false calves making -with one real one-a total of three. His duties are to hold on to the carriage, to preserve a stolid gravity in his face, a small frown of importance on his brow, an unwrinkled state of spruce erection in his white cravat, to leap from his stand when the carriage stops, to touch his hat whenever he is looked at, and to treat the lady's maid with a kind of deferential familiarity, which he wishes to impose upon the world for love-making.

One would naturally suppose that this brilliant equipage was called into action to do honor to some important occasion of infinitely greater consequence than shopping; but so it is. In the carriage are two young and handsome ladies of eighteen or thereabouts, reclining in attitudes of Eastern voluptuousness, and a young man of unimpeachable moustaches and cravat, lolling luxuriously back, smiling and biting a rose-bud, in order to show his white teeth. A young gentleman invited "down" probably, on some speculation of alliance, perhaps merely because he has gained celebrity as a "diner-out," and has a happy knack of saying smart things at a dull season. At his side on cushions are seated two Blenheim spaniels; and an Italian greyhound, with a silver collar and chain, is standing "rampant," with his two forefeet upon the carriage door, barking with a tiny snappish voice at foot-passengers. The carriage is also accompanied-by way of foot-guards— by two large spotted Danish dogs, running one on

each side of it.

The elegant" set out" now stops at an apothecary's shop, the tall fellow behind leaps from his standing place; and, walking to the door of the carriage, assumes a demure look, and touches his hat. The proprietor of the shop, in his haste forgetting to remove his white apron, runs to the carriage and shows a shining bald head to the ladies, as he bows obsequiously. They order him to send a few bottles of eau de cologne to the Hall; this he promises to do, with a profusion of compliments and thanks for their patronage. You may observe, while they are stopping, half a dozen fellows who were talking gossip in a group about forty yards distant; three of them hastily retire to their shops in expectation of a call, and the others instinctively "hem" to clear their throats, although they have no idea of speaking, and walk with a sanctified gait past the carriage, merely to have the gratification of lifting their hats to the great people. You may perceive, also, that every horseman, and every other passenger, ease their consciences by performing the same action; and you may notice likewise, if you are a person of acute observation, that a couple of beggars (one of whom is blind, and led by a young girl) who have assailed every person they have met with importunities, leave off begging, as if by some tacit agreement, as they near the carriage, and hurry past it like convicted criminals. To all these obeisances the young

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