that golden hair, and "the lightning of that angel smile,” and all those other beauties which made him a

lover "marked out from among men," a being abstracted"from the rest of his species,"

"a little dust, without a feeling,"

"Poca polvere son che nulla sente;"

are now

or repeating that beautiful lyric of the last of the Shakespearian men, Shirley, which they say touched even the thoughtless bosom of Charles the Second:

DEATH'S FINAL CONQUEST.

The glories of our birth and state
Are shadows, not substantial things:
There is no armor against fate;
Death lays his icy hand on kings:
Sceptre and crown

Must tumble down,

And in the dust be equal made

With the poor crooked scythe and spade.

Some men with swords may reap the field,
And plant fresh laurels where they kill:
But their strong nerves at last must yield;
They tame but one another still.

Early or late

They stoop to fate,

And must give up their murmuring breath,
When they, pale captives, creep to death.

The garlands wither on your brow;
Then boast no more your mighty deeds:
Upon Death's purple altar now

See where the victor-victim bleeds!

All heads must come

To the cold tomb:

Only the actions of the just

Smell sweet, and blossom in the dust.

Most true; but, with the leave of the fine poet (which he would gladly have conceded to us), Death's conquest is not "final;" for Heaven triumphs over him, and love too, and poetry; and thus we can get through the cloud even of his dust, and shake it, in aspiration, from our wings. Besides, we know not, with any exactitude, what or who Death is, or whether there is any such personage, even in his negative sense, except inasmuch as he is a gentle voice, calling upon us to go some journey: for the very dust that he is supposed to deal in is alive; is the cradle of other beings and vegetation; nay, its least particle belongs to a mighty life; is planetary; is part of our star; is the stuff of which the worlds are made, that roll and rejoice round the

sun.

Of these or the like reflections, serious or otherwise, are the cogitations. of the true pedestrian composed : such are the weapons with which he triumphs over the most hostile of his clouds, whether material or metaphorical; and, at the end of his dusty walk, he beholdeth, in beautiful perspective, the towel, and the basin and water, with which he will render his eyes, cheeks, and faculties as cool and fresh as if no dust had touched them; nay, more so for the contrast. Never forget that secret of the reconcilements of this life. To sit down, newly washed and dressed, after a dusty journey, and hear that dinner is to be ready "in ten minutes," is a satisfaction, -a crowning and "measureless content," - which we hope no one will enjoy who does not allow fair play between the harmless lights and shadows of existence, and treat his

dust with respect. We defy him to enjoy it, at any rate, like those who do. His ill-temper, somehow or other, will rise in retribution against him, and find dust on his saddle of mutton.

145

BRICKLAYERS, AND AN OLD BOOK.

T is a very hot day and a

"dusty day:" you

are passing through a street in which there is no shade, a new street, only half built and half paved; the areas unfinished as you advance (it is to be hoped no drunken man will stray there); the floors of the houses only raftered (you can't go in and sit down); broken glass, at the turnings, on the bits of garden wall; the time, noon; the month, August; the whole place glaring with the sun, and colored with yellow brick, chalk, and lime. Occasionally you stumble upon the bottom of an old saucepan, or kick a baked shoe.

In this very hot passage through life, you are longing for soda-water or for the sound of a pump; when suddenly you —

"Hear a trowel tick against a brick,"

and down a ladder by your side, which bends at every step, comes dancing, with hod on shoulder, a bricklayer, who looks as dry as his vocation; his eyes winking, his mouth gaping; his beard grim with a week's growth, the rest of his hair like a badger's. You then, for the first time, see a little water by the wayside, thick and white with chalk; and are doubting whether to admire it as a liquid, or detest it for its

と

color; when a quantity of lime is dashed against the sieve, and you receive in your eyes and mouth a taste of the dry and burning elements of mortar, without the refreshment of the wet. Finally, your shoe is burned; and as the bricklayer says something to his fellow in Irish, who laughs, you fancy that he is witty at your expense, and has made some ingenious bull.

"A pretty picture, Mr. Seer! and very refreshing, this hot weather!"

Oh! but you are only a chance acquaintance of us, my dear sir: you don't know what philosophies we writers and readers of "The Seer" possess, which render us "lords of ourselves," unencumbered even with the mighty misery of a hot day, and the hod on another man's shoulder. You, unfortunate easy man, have been thinking of nothing but the "aggravations of the street all this while, and are ready to enter your house, after the walk, in a temper to kick off your shoes into the servant's face. We, besides being in the street, have been in all sorts of pleasant and remote places; have been at Babylon; have been at Bagdad; have bathed in the river Tigris, the river of that city of the "Arabian Nights;" nay, have been in Paradise itself! led by old Bochart and his undeniable maps, where you see the place as "graphically set forth" as though it had never vanished, and Adam and Eve walking in it, taller than the trees. We are writing upon the very book this moment, instead of a desk, a fond custom of ours; though, for dignity's sake, we beg to say we have a desk: but we like an old folio to write upon, written by some happy believing hand, no matter whether we go all lengths or not with