at the end of that time, Dr. Howard had in vain labored among my jealous preservers to learn even so much as her name, or the period of the wreck; which latter he could only guess at by forming his own conclusions as to my age, and coupling with them the fact he had learned, that I was an infant too young to speak, when I came ashore. In short, strange and wondrous as the circumstances all seemed, and imperfect as they were in the chain of connection, they bore with them such convincing evidence of my identity, that neither Isabel nor I could longer doubt we were brother and sister, the twin-born offspring of parents long since passed away to the world of death. We wept and embraced, and exchanged, by a natural transition, the fervor of lovers for the affection of brother and sister, which a romantic casuistry has pronounced to be the purest and heavenliest of all the bonds that connect the hearts of man and woman. I learned from Isabel, what I had in part been informed of-that my father, with his younger brother, the present Intendant, had emigrated from South Carolina in the war of the Revolution, being loyalists, whom the fall of British power, in the colonies reduced to ruin. They had entered the Spanish service in Cuba; where the elder brother acquired rank in the army, and rose to wealth by espousing a Spanish heiress, my mother and Isabel's; but, in an unfortunate moment, was drawn into some treasonable project or conspiracy to subvert the Spanish power in the island. The conspiracy was discovered, and my father escaped from the officers appointed to arrest him, only through the instrumentality of the younger brother; who, faithful throughout to the government he served, yet ardently attached to my father, procured him the means of flight in the fatal schooner. One boat carried to her my father and little Juan--myself--with a single attendant, and such valuables as he had time to collect; another following with my mother and sister, was intercepted; and my father was compelled by extreme peril to set sail alone. Neither my father, nor the schooner, nor any of her crew were ever heard of afterwards, until Brown's sudden appearance in Pensacola. Grief for her husband's fate, which had been followed by the confiscation of his estates, drove my mother to the tomb. Isabel, a portionless orphan, was adopted by her uncle; whose own wife (for he also had married in the island,) died in a few years, leaving him childless; and who, partly by purchase, and partly through the bounty of the government which could thus reward his own long and faithful services, had effected the recovery of a great part of his brother's estates; which, with his own, were destined to swell the dowry, or inheritance, of his adopted daughter. This discovery, brought about by a means so simple, and at a time so perilous, had the happiest effect on the spirits of Isabel, who declared, with pious fervor, that the Providence which had in so extraordinary a manner brought us together and revealed the secret of our relationship, could not have done so only to let us perish in each other's arms on the broad deep; and her confidence restored me in part to mine. Isabel and Day are rescued from the jolly-boat by an American schooner, which is taken by the pirates; but not until Isabel and the captain's wife are concealed among the ballast of the crippled and burning vessel. The pirates are pursued by the armed brig Vengador, and in the midst of a storm both vessels are driven upon a reef of rocks. From this situation the two parties escape to the land, where, after a conflict in which colonel Aubrey and Dicky Dare are engaged among the forces against them, the pirates are defeated. In this struggle Brown is wounded, as also, Robin Day. suit of Brown and his crew has been seen. After the conflict, the wounded were put into the hands of an American physician, doctor Howard, who had visited the island for the benefit of his sick daughter, Nanna. Brown and Skipper Duck firmly established the identity of Robin Day with little Juan Aubrey. Brown survived his wounds but three days, and confessed before he died, the truth concerning the father of our hero. Tempted by Aubrey's wealth, and obtaining the aid of the crew of the Sally Ann, they murdered him and his attendants in the night, scuttled the vessel, took boat and reached the land. Although Brown wished to save Juan, the scheme was objected to by the others, and the utmost favor granted the infant, was to be left to the mercy of the waters. The schooner was bored, yet did not go down, but went ashore with the child in the manner mentioned in the commencement of the story. Skipper Duck, who was captured on board the Viper, corroborated nearly all of Brown's story, and died in consequence of a gangrene received from a scourging given him by Brown. Tommy's claims were also settled, and he was clasped once more to the fond and hoping hearts of a father and a sister. The letter which, it will be remembered, our hero wrote while among the British, and which he had deposited in a post-office during his adventures as Chowder Chow, cleared up his character to his patron; although the health of his beloved Nanna was so much affected, that it was found necessary to take a voyage to the island of Cuba. In conclusion ;-Robin marries Nanna, Dicky is wedded to glory and cut to pieces in Mexico; Tommy, recovering from his mental torpor, becomes a midshipman, and the adventures of Robin Day wind up with and felicity of Juan Aubrey. the peace Our readers, we repeat, will form a general idea of the work from this compendium. We do not discover from it any particular power which the author possesses in nice delineations of character-there is no great depth of thought evinced, no peculiar beauty of language, or remarkable degree of taste. We do not say that doctor Bird is not capable of these things; it is very probable that he purposely discards and sacrifices them for some prime object; we are speaking now only of the book before us. We cannot think, moreover, that it is filled with the most profitable food which a novel is capable of affording. But, whatever may be its errors of omission and commission, it is, nevertheless, an interesting, and a well conducted tale. It is full, as we have before said, of absorbing incident, and, on the whole, will at least preserve, if not add to, the laurels already brightening around the name of its popular and deserving author. VIRTUE. Our hero wakes to sense, to behold around him his kind patron, doctor Howard, colonel Aubrey, Isabel, Nanna, Dicky Dare and master Tommy. It appears that the Vengador had set out in pursuit of the pirate ship, taking with her Aubrey, Dicky Dare and Tommy. The reports of the pirate's guns, engaged with the Virtue may be misrepresented, persecuted, consignAmerican schooner, drew her to the scene of conflict. ed to the grave—but the righteous wake not more asIsabel and the captain's wife were rescued by the Ven-suredly to the reality of their hopes than this to an imgador's boat from the vessel, and the result of the pur-mortal remembrance.―[Anon. THE BIRDS IN AUTUMN. BY MRS. SIGOURNEY. November came on, with an eye severe, And his stormy language was hoarse to hearAnd the glittering garland of brown and red, Which he wreath'd for awhile round the forest's head, With sudden anger he rent away, And all was cheerless, and bare, and gray. Then the houseless grasshopper told his woes, And the humming bird sent forth a wail for the rose; And the spider, that weaver of cunning so deep, Roll'd himself up, like a ball, to sleep; And the cricket, his merry horn laid by, On the shelf, with the pipe of the dragon-fly. Soon, voices were heard at the morning prime, "Let us go! let us go!" said the bright-winged jay- "Will you go?" ask'd the robin, "my only love?" The oriole told, with a flashing eye, "I am ready to go," said the plump young wren, Then up went the thrush, with a trumpet call; "The dahlia is dead on her throne," said they; But what a strange clamor on elm and oak, Then tribe after tribe, with its leader fair, Some spread o'er the waters a daring wing, The Indian fig, with its arching screen, O wild-wood wanderers! how far away UNCLE PETE AND THE BEAR. By the author of the original "Jack Downing" Letters. Among the different sections of this widely extended and variegated country, I question whether any portion of equal extent can exhibit more richness of landscape, or more wildness, beauty and grandeur of scenery, than the state of Maine. The western prairies are beautiful and grand; but their beauty and grandeur are like the ocean in a calm summer's day, with its smooth, unruffled bosom, and its long rolling swell; while much of the scenery of Maine resembles the same ocean when lashed into fury by the raging storm, and dashing and breaking its foamy waves into rugged hills and mountains. inland from the ocean near a hundred miles. Here we Go with me to a somewhat central spot in Maine, stand upon the broad, bare back of a rough granite mountain. It extends north and west of us in broken ridges for several miles. Now and then you behold the trunk of a dry pine, which has been felled by the fire, and stretched upon the gray rock, like the straggling hairs upon the bald head of an old man. And here and there you see patches of low shrubbery bending beneath the weight of thick clusters of the blue whortleberry. Look away to the north, and your eye rests for half a dozen miles on a level tract of rich forest. Then rises abruptly a cone-like mountain, throwing its peaked summit far into the clouds, and standing, like a sentinel on duty, to overlook the country for many miles round. In the distance beyond, both to the right hand and the left, you see mountain after mountain, with their round shaggy tops, swelling and rolling, height above height, till they are lost among the misty clouds, or rest in Now turn softened lines against the clear blue sky. The name of this beautiful collection of water is Sebec Pond, and the spot where we are now standing, at the head of this pond, is about fifteen miles from Noosehead Lake. Turn and look away a little to the left, and you will see the Wilson stream, a lovely little river, winding its bright way among the trees near the base of the opposite ledgy hills, gliding gently across the interval, and carrying its silent waters into the deep basin before us. Deep it truly is, corresponding with the high and broken hilis around it; for I have been told that in some parts of this pond the bottom has never been reached, although lines have been let down to the distance of several hundred feet. -'monarch of all he surveys,' And-lord of the fowl and the brute.' I am told, that before taking up his residence in this wild spot, he had several times pitched his tent in the wilderness, and tarried for a few years, till civilization and settlements overtook him, and thickened around him, to such a degree as to become inconvenient and troublesome, when he would 'pull up stakes' and push farther into the woods. The place where he now resides is an unincorporated township of wild land, and being somewhat difficult of access, except by coming up the pond from Sebec, a distance of about a dozen miles, uncle Pete has lived for something like ten years in a condition of tolerably satisfactory independence. He raises some provisions on his cultivated acres, and procures some game from the woods; and when these sources fail, he takes his hook and line and goes out to some of the ponds or streams in the neighborhood, and returns with a load of trout and other varieties of the finny tribe. For calico, tea, and tobacco, and other 'boughten' articles of use or luxury, he goes now and then to Sebec with a canoe load of singles and clapboards, which are his regular articles of export. But civilized life is again treading upon the heels of uncle Pete. The towns around him are becoming thickly settled, and though there is but one other family on the township with him, yet the visits of proprietors and proprietors' agents are becoming so frequent, and they cast such scrutinizing glances upon sundry pine stumps which they occasionally find on the premises, that uncle Pete grows restless and uneasy. He feels that he is rather crowded upon, and sometimes talks of 'selling out.' It was in the autumn of 1836, that I first visited this wild spot, and first saw or heard any thing of uncle Pete. Stopping at the house of an old man, another pioneer of the frontier settlers, some six or eight miles from this spot, I heard the old man remark, while conversing with another, "Well, uncle Pete's had a squabble with a bear lately, haint he?' I at once felt a curiosity to learn the history of this 'squabble,' and accordingly made some inquiries, in answer to which I learnt the general outline of the story, and subsequently obtained the details and the filling up from uncle Pete himself. It was a bright and a calm summer's morning; the quiet pond was sleeping in the sunshine, harmless and beautiful; and every surrounding object in nature looked lovely and inviting. There is something in the effect of a fine landscape, viewed under favorable circumstances, which may be compared to music-it'hath charms to soothe the savage breast.' Even uncle Pete felt its influence, as he sat on a little bench by the side of his cottage, yawning and looking listlessly across the still waters, and following the outline of forest tree, and hill top, and mountain, that hung below the watery horizon, as well defined, as clear and distinct, and even with more softness than those which were towering above. While he gazed, he was seized with a desire You observe a few acres of cultivated land on the interval between the Wilson stream and the base of the granite mountain on which we are standing; and there, close by the margin of the river, you see a small, low house. In that house there lives, and has lived for some ten years past, an old man by the name of Peter Brawn. He is often designated in that vicinity by the familiar appellation of Uncle Pete. Nothing, however, could be more appropriate than his true name, so accurately and forcibly does the sign represent the thing signified; for a more vigorous, athletic, and brawny old man, you will not find one in a thousand. He must be over seventy years of age, for his long thin locks are silvery white, and though he has one or two children in their minority still with him, he has numerous sons and daughters who have reached the middle age of life, and gone abroad into the world with families of their own. The old man is full six feet in height, and stands as straight as an arrow. He is neither decidedly fleshy, nor lean; but stout, bony and musculous. From his natural constitution and habits of life he evidently for an aquatic excursion. He called his youngest boy, possesses great strength, and is capable of enduring great hardships. He has for many years been a sort of pioneer to the frontier settlers in the interior of Maine, always keeping a little in advance of them, preferring to live alone in the woods, where, unshackled by the restraints of society or the statute, he can feel that he is a lad about a dozen years old, and told him to get the hooks and lines, and they would go round the point to the mouth of Ship-pond stream, and try for trout. The apparatus was soon in readiness, and they jumped into his little log canoe and paddled off upon the lake. "We had n't got but a little ways round the pint," said uncle Pete, "and I was setting in the starn, pad- | my forehead, jest as a boy digs his teeth into the side dling along at a moderate jog, and little Pete was setting in the bow; and by and by he called out to me, and says he, 'O, father, what great black critter is that swimming off here towards us?' I looked round towards the shore, and there was the tarnalest great overgrown bear that ever I seed in all my life, swimming right towards us. If he had been weighed, I believe he would a weighed every pound of four hundred." I never examined uncle Pete's head phrenologically, and cannot say whether his organ of marvellousness was of extra size or not. The reader must, therefore, be content with such evidence as we have with regard to the weight of the bear; and that rests solely on uncle Pete's word and judgment. He always stood to it the bear would weigh four hundred pounds. of a great apple. Thinks I, this 'll never do; something must be done pretty quick. I made a terrible twist, and drawed my legs up under him, and got so I could give a push with my feet, and my knees and hands, then all to once I fetched an everlasting spring, and how I did it I do n't know, but somehow or other the old bear went overboard, and plunged head foremost into the water. I was on my feet as quick as a steel trap. The old bear come up to the top of the water and snorted, and looked up at me a minute; but I believe I had fairly skeered him out of it. He turned about and swum for the shore, and I paddled for home. When I got to the house, I told my wife we'd have some potatoes for dinner, and let the fish go." Suggested by an engraving with the above motto, representing a female who had been gathering flowers, as coming unexpectedly upon old tombstones in a wood. I. "I went to gather flowers," So spake a lovely maid- 11. Swift flew the laughing hours, As tripp'd that gladsome maid; III. I mark what 'tis that causes IV. "And the tarnal critter," said uncle Pete, "was pulling right towards us as fast as he could swim. I'd been so careless in coming away, that I only took one small paddle with me, and that was n't a very good one, and "I WENT TO GATHER FLOWERS." the old canoe was rather heavy; so I found, do the best I could, the bear would swim faster than I could paddle. But I thought I could keep him off well enough if he should set out to meddle with us, so I turned the boat and paddled a little towards him. I thought that would make him turn and go off. But the old savage kept swimming right towards us, and come up close to the side of the canoe, and begun to open his mouth, and show a great ugly set of teeth as ever you see. He come up so near that I hit him a lick over the head with the paddle and split it in two. At that he come right at the boat faircer than ever, and put his paw right up on to one side of it. I sprung into the middle of the boat, and bore on 'tother side of it, for I knew if I did n't, he would upset us in a minute; and I thought I should n't like very well to have a grapple with him in the water. So while I was keeping the balance of the boat, the rascally old varmin pokes up 'tother paw and begins to crawl up. I could n't go to fight him off, for then we should all go into the water together. So I had to hold still and see the great black nigger crawl clear up into the boat. He got in pretty near the starn, and I stood about in the middle. As soon as he got fairly in, he looked round to me, and then he rared right up on to his hind legs and walked towards me as straight as a man. He was as tall as I was, and looked as big as a clever young ox. I stood facing of him, and while I was thinking how it was best to give battle to him, he marched straight up to me, and put one paw on my right shoulder, and 'tother on my left. Thinks I, this is bein' a leetle bit too sociable for a stranger; and I was jest agoin to tell him, hands off, when his weight pressing against me made me step back a little, and my heel ketched against something in the boat, and I fell flat on my back in the bottom of the boat, and the old bear on top of me. By this time I begun to think matters was getting worse and worse, and it was time for me to begin to look about myself. I twisted one way and 'tother, and we begun to have considerable of a squabble; but the old bear had altogether the advantage of me, and I could n't seem to do much. I tried to get hold of my jack-knife, but I could n't get it out of my pocket, all I could do. The old bear did n't seem to be willing to wait to give me fair play at all; for in a minute I felt him trying to stick his huge tusks into Old graves are yawning on her V. A tale of dread they've told her, VI. That after some bright hours And fast bright hours fly- VII. Oh, how her teeth did chatter, Oh how her frame was shook; VIII. Go-gather not all flowers, Though they should gaily bloom; NUGATOR. PAYMENTS TO THE SOUTHERN LITERARY MESSENGER, MADE BETWEEN THE FIRST AND THE TWENTY-EIGHTH DAY OF MAY, 1839. All persons who have made payments early enough to be entered, and whose names do not appear in this published receipt list, or in that of the next number, are requested to give notice of the omission immediately after receiving that No., in order that the correction may be forthwith made. Anderson, William..... Branch, David M.. Booth, William.. Brooke, S. S... ..Richmond, Virginia....vol v Mason, Barlow........h&d........ Price, Thomas R.. Wisconsin....vol v .Louisiana....vol v .New York....vol v .Morgansburg, Virginia..vols 4-5 .wba.. .Accomac, Va..vols 2-3-4 Houston County, Georgia....vol v ...Richmond, Virginia....vol v .Tennessee....vol v ....Ohio....vol v E......wba........Maine....vol v ...Louisville, Georgia....vol v .........Columbus, Georgia....vol v .........Brunswick, Virginia....vol v ........Baltimore, Maryland....vol v ......Richmond, Virginia....vol v W.......Robertsville, South Carolina....vol v .Southampton County, Virginia....vol v .Washington, Arkansas..vols 3.4 .Richmond, Virginia....vol v .Lunenburg Court House....vol v ....Powhatan, Virginia....vol v ..rmc.... ....Georgia..vols 4-5 Snyder, Charles L........Roanoke County, Virginia....vol v Scott, Dr. William S... .Richmond, Virginia....vol v Smith, Mrs. Margaret Farley.... Hanover, Virginia..vols 4.5 Shinn, Stephen.... ......h&d.. ..Alexandria, D. C....vol 5 Stott, Charles........h&d.........Washington, D. C....vol 5 Skinner, William C....... Perquiman's County, N. C....vol v Simms, Thomas P. .Madison County, Virginia....vol v Scott, Judge John.....h&d. Warrenton, Virginia....vol v Smith, Miss Julia..... Steel, Miss Martha E.. Snead, Dr Albert... Sale, Miss M. D.. Robinson, Henry M... Richmond, Virginia....vol v Myers, Gustavus A..... Hill, Jones.. Harvey, Misses......... Hagner, Charles N......h&d. .Richmond, Virginia....vol v Matthews, Virginia....vol v ..Jacksonville, Illinois..vols 5-6 William & Mary College..vols 4-5 .....Hillsboro, Ohio....vol v ..Milton, South Carolina....vol v P....h&d....Washington, D. C....vol v (President U. S.)....Washington....vol 5 ..fan.......Columbus, Georgia....vol v ..Richmond, Virginia....vol v ......Richmond, Virginia....vol v .Oak Hill, Virginia....vol v ...Georgia....vol v .New York....vol v .Richmond, Virginia....vol v Wickham, Mrs Elizabeth........Richmond, Virginia....vol v FIFTY COPIES OF THE JANUARY NO. WANTED. The Editor of the Messenger being able to furnish only a few more new subscribers with the present volume, complete, owing to his supply of the January No. 1839, being nearly exhausted, is desirous of purchasing fifty or sixty copies of that No. from those who may feel disposed to part with it. Seventy Five cents each, will be paid for that number, if furnished forthwith, and perfect in every respect as when forwarded from the office of publication. Also, wanted one or two copies of the First Volume of the Messenger, for which, if in, perfect order, the subscription price will be paid on delivery. |