thay rue it. We may not live to the time when this declaration shall be made good. We may die; die colonists; die, slaves; die, it may be, ignominiously, and on the scaffold. Be it so. Be it so. If it be the pleasure of Heaven, that my country shall require the poor offering of my life, the victim shall be ready, at the appointed hour of sacrifice, come when that hour may. But, while I do live, let me have a country, or at least the hope of a country, and that a free country.

12. But, whatever may be our fate, be assured, be assured, that this declaration will stand. It may cost treasure, and it may cost blood; but it will stand, and it will richly compen sate for both. Through the thick gloom of the present, I see the brightness of the future, as the sun in heaven. We shall make this a glorious, an immortal day. When we are in our graves, our children will honour it. They will celebrate it with thanksgiving, with festivity, with bonfires, and illuminations. On its annual return, they will shed tears, copious, gushing tears, not of subjection and slavery, not of agony and distress, but of exultation, of gratitude, and of joy.

13. Sir, before God, I believe that the hour is come. My judgement approves this measure, and my whole heart is in it. All that I have, and all that I am, and all that I hope, in this life, I am now ready here to stake upon it; and I leave off, as I begun, that, live or die, survive or perish, I am for the declaration. It is my living sentiment, and, by the blessing of God, it shall be my dying sentiment, independence now, and INDEPENDENCE FOR EVER.-WEBSTER.

LESSON CXXIV.

The Western Emigrant.

1. AMID these forest shades that proudly reared
Their unshorn beauty towards the favouring skies,
An axe rang sharply. There, with vigorous arm,
Wrought a bold emigrant, while by his side

2.

His little son with question and response
Beguiled the toil.

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'Boy, thou hast never seen

Such glorious trees, and when the giant trunks
Fall, how the firm earth groans. Rememberest thou
The mighty river on whose breast we sailed
So many days on toward the setting sun?

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

Compared to that, our own Connecticut
Is but a creeping stream."

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Father, the brook,
That by our door went singing, when I launched
My tiny boat with all the sportive boys,
When school was o'er, is dearer far to me
Than all these deep broad waters. To my eye
They are as strangers. And those little trees
My mother planted in the garden, bound,
Of our first home, from whence the fragrant peach
Fell in its ripening gold, were fairer sure
Than this dark forest shutting out the day."

"What, ho! my little girl," and with light step
A fairy creature hasted toward her sire,
And setting down the basket that contained
The noon's repast, looked upward to his face
With sweet, confiding smile.

"See, dearest, see
Yon bright winged paroquet, and hear the song
Of the gay red-bird echoing through the trees,
Making rich musick. Did'st thou ever hear
In far New England such a mellow tone?"

"I had a robin that did take the crumbs
Each night and morning, and his chirping voice
Did make me joyful, as I went to tend
My snow-drops. I was always laughing there,
In that first home. I should be happier now,
Methinks, if I could find among these dells
The same fresh violets."

Slow night drew on,

And round the rude hut of the emigrant,

The wrathful spirit of the autumn storm

Spake bitter things. His wearied children slept, And he, with head declined, sat listening long To the swollen waters of the Illinois,

Dashing against their shores. Starting, he spake:

"Wife! did I see thee brush away a tear? Say, was it so? Thy heart was with the halls Of thy nativity. Their sparkling lights,

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10..

Carpets and sofas, and admiring guests,
Befit thee better than these rugged walls
Of shapeless logs, and this lone hermit-home."

"No, No! All was so still around, methought,
Upon my ear that echoed hymn did steal

Which 'mid the church, where erst we paid our vows,
So tuneful pealed. But tenderly thy voice
Dissolved the illusion;" and the gentle smile
Lighting her brow, the fond caress that soothed
Her waking infant, re-assured his soul
That whereso'er the pure affections dwell
And strike a healthful root, is happiness.

Placid and grateful to his rest he sank;

But dreams, those wild magicians, which do play
Such pranks when reason slumbers, tireless wrought
Their will with him. Up rose the busy mart
Of his own native city: roof and spire

All glittering bright, in fancy's frost-work ray.

11. Forth came remembered forms; with curving neck
The steed his boyhood nurtured, proudly neighed ;
The favourite dog, exulting round his feet,
Frisked, with shrill, joyous bark; familiar doors
Flew open; greeting hands with his were linked
In friendship's grasp; he heard the keen debate
From congregated haunts, where mind with mind
Doth blend and brighten; and till morning roved
'Mid the loved scenery of his father-land.

MRS. SIGOURNEY.

LESSON CXXV.

Notch in the White Mountains.

1. THE sublime and awful grandeur of this passage baffles all description. Geometry may settle the heights of the mountains; and numerical figures may record the measure; but no words can tell the emotions of the soul, as it looks upward, and views. the almost perpendicular precipices which line the narrow space between them; while the senses ache with terrour and astonishment, as one sees himself hedged in from all the world besides.

2. He may cast his eye forward, or backward, or to either side; he can see only upward, and there the diminutive circle of his vision is cribbed and confined by the battlements of nature's "cloud-capped towers," which seem as if they wanted only the breathing of a zephyr, or the wafting of a straw against them, to displace them, and crush the prisoner in their fall,

3. Just before our visit to this place, on the twenty-sixth of June, 1826, there was a tremendous avalanche, or slide, as it is there called, from the mountain which makes the southern wall of the passage. An immense mass of earth and rock, on the side of the mountain, was loosened from its resting place, and began to slide toward the bottom.

4. In its course, it divided into three portions, each coming down, with amazing velocity, into the road, and sweeping before it, shrubs, trees, and rocks, and filling up the road, be yond all possibility of its being removed. With great labour, a pathway has been made over these fallen masses, which admits the passage of a carriage.

5. The place from which the slide, or slip, was loosened, is directly in the rear of a small, but comfortable dwelling-house, owned and occupied by a Mr. Willey, who has taken advantage of a narrow, a very narrow interval, where the bases of the two mountains seem to have parted and receded, as if afraid of coming into contact, to erect his lone habitation: and, were there not a special Providence in the fall of a sparrow, and had not the finger of that Providence traced the direction of the sliding mass, neither he, nor any soul of his family, would ever have told the tale.

6. They heard the noise, when it first began to move, and ran to the door. In terrour and amazement, they beheld the mountain in motion. But what can human power effect in such an emergency? Before they could think of retreating, or ascertain which way to escape, the danger was passed.

7. One portion of the avalanche crossed the road abou: ten rods only from their habitation; the second, a few rods be yond that; and the third, and much the largest portion, took a much more oblique direction, The whole area, now covered by the slide, is nearly an acre; and the distance of its present bed from its former place on the side of the mountain, and which it moved over in a few minutes, is from three quarters of a mile to a mile.

8. There are many trees of large size, that came down with such force as to shiver them in pieces; and innumerable rocks, of many tuns weight, any one of which was sufficient to carry with it destruction to any of the labours of man. The spot on

the mountain, from which the slip was loosened, is now a naked, white rock; and its pathway downward is indicated by deep channels, or furrows, grooved in the side of the mountain, and down one of which pours a stream of water, sufficient to carry a common saw-mill.

9. From this place to the Notch, there is almost a continual ascent, generally gradual, but sometimes steep and sudden. The narrow pathway proceeds along the stream, sometimes crossing it, and shifting from the side of one mountain to the other, as either furnishes a less precarious foothold for the traveller than its fellow.

10. Occasionally it winds up the side of the steep to such a height, as to leave, on one hand or the other, a gulf of unseen depth; for the foliage of the trees and shrubs is impervious to the sight.

11. The Notch itself is formed by a sudden projection of rock from the mountain on the right or northerly side, rising perpendicularly to a great height, probably seventy or eighty feet, and by a large mass of rock on the left side, which has tumbled from its ancient location, and taken a position within twenty feet of its opposite neighbour.

12. The length of the Notch is not more than three or four rods. The moment it is passed, the mountains seem to have vanished. A level meadow, overgrown with long grass and wild flowers, and spotted with tufts of shrubbery, spreads itself before the astonished eye, on the left, and a swamp, or thicket, on the right, conceals the ridge of mountains which extend to the north the road separates this thicket from the meadow.

13. Not far from the Notch, on the right hand side of the road, several springs issue from the rocks that compose the base of the mountain, unite in the thicket, and form the Saco river. This little stream runs across the road into the meadow, where it almost loses itself in its meandering among the bogs, but again collects its waters, and passes under the rock that makes the southerly wall of the Notch.

14. It is here invisible for several rods, and its presence is indicated only by its noise, as it rolls through its rugged tunnel. In wet seasons and freshets, probably a portion of the water passes over the fragments of rock, which are here wedged together, and form an arch, or covering, for the natural bed of the stream.

15. The sensations which affect the corporeal faculties as one views these stupendous creations of Omnipotence, are absolutely afflicting and painful. If you look at the summits of the mountains, when a cloud passes towards them, it is impos