mitting the Rules and Regulations again to a mixed | footing with the Medical corps of the Army; and commission has been echoed, though imperfectly, to attain its object it will openly resort to every in the reply it calls for the same officers who honorable means. formed the informal Board, with the addition of a That this honorable body has many more able Surgeon, but bitterly opposes the idea of any Sur- and accomplished advocates of its views than I am, geon being assigned to this duty who has either there is but little doubt; but the cause seemed to me written or spoken on the subject. But why not? so reasonable, so just, requiring only a moderate Has not every member of that Board, as well as degree of ability to plead, that I have been temptits defender, (perhaps himself a member?) com-ed to venture my small skill, and if I have totally mitted himself to 66 angry discussion," at least failed in my object, I can console myself in the resince it has been found their work was not univer-flection that I have labored honestly in the hope of sally approved? Have the members of that Board increasing the standing and professional skill of been quiet and silent as regards the claims of the the Medical officers of the Navy, without a wish the Medical corps-have not these claims been the to injure any class in the service. In the interest subject of much talk among these very gentlemen? I take in the general welfare of the Navy, and the And why should the act of discussion disqualify a advancement of our country towards excellence in Surgeon but not a Purser or sea-officer? Excuse all things, I yield to no man. the coarse vulgarity of the expression, but I must insist upon, "what is sauce for goose is sauce for gander." Therefore, as the case of the Medical corps was one of hardship"-and is still-to be misrepresented, "by a person practically ignorant of their wants and duties," (in which ignorance there is a striking similarity between the author of the "reply" and the chief of the Bureau)—" and if

a recommendation from an humble and nameless source would avail any thing, it might be respectfully suggested," that the plan proposed by Toga Civilis, (page 377, vol. ix, June, 1843, “Southern Literary Messenger") be carried out. But let the

Board consist of men who have served in their

respective grades at least five years at sea- (as

there is no commander on the list who has served

TOGA CIVILIS.

VIRGINIA ANTIQUITIES.

James River, known as the original seat of the Turkey Island.-This is a beautiful old place on Randolphs of Virginia. Having heard that there were some old tomb-stones of that family there, and a monument, I had the curiosity some time ago, to visit it for the purpose of seeing them. The monument seems to have been erected partly as a cenotaph and partly to commemorate an extraordinary fresh that occurred in 1771. It stands on elevated ground, about a mile back from the so long as that, I would say for that grade, at least river, and is now surrounded by woods grown up three years)-let Mr. Upshur's suggestion be tried, since its erection. The top of the monument has of making this Board consist of two from each been broken off by the fall of a tree. It is of obegrade of comission officers. If every one of these lisk form,-present height about 18 feet,-base, members had served, within fifteen years past, five six feet square. It is built of brick, faced with years at sea in the grade he represents, the Board Portland stone, which, of course, was imported would probably include a fair representation of from England. the experience and knowledge of the whole service.

If such a commission be formed,-an act of Congress is not necessary for it-as suggested, and the members of it come to their duty in a spirit of candor and willingness to benefit the country by improving the Rules of the Navy, I will venture to say, every grade in the service will be satisfied with the result of its labors and it will be found that, although there may be at first wide differences of opinion, warmly expressed, there is no grade in the Navy that entertains hostile feelings towards other grades; all will yield up something; selfishness will sacrifice itself for the common good and harmony of all.

The Inscriptions on it, are as follows:

[South Side.]

The Foundation
of this Pillar was laid
in the calamitous year
1771.

When all the great Rivers

of this Country
Were swept by Inundations
Never before experienced :
Which changed the face of Nature
And left traces of their Violence
That will remain
For Ages.

[For the details of this extraordinary fresh, see Virginia Gazette, for May 30th, 1771-also the Scots (Edinburgh) Magazine, for July, of the same

In conclusion, I repeat, the Medical corps of the Navy seeks for nothing that will thwart discipline | year.] or is not designed for the general good of the service. It entertains no feelings of hostility to any branch of the service: it asks to be placed on a

[North Side.]

Oh Earth to him indulgent be
Who
* bestowed on thee

The tomb of Washington, at Mount Vernon.
nice of white marble, are the following lines in
Above the railings of the vault, and upon a cor-
golden letters :-
:-

"WITHIN THIS ENCLOSURE REST,
the remains of

GEN. GEORGE WASHINGTON."
Upon the lid of the marble sarcophagus is sculp-
tured the coat of arms of the United States of
America, with the brief, but sufficient, epitaph:

"WASHINGTON."

Matoax.-Matoax is situated on the North side of the Appomattox river, above the falls and about a mile from the town of Petersburg. Matoax, (or Matoaca) it is said, was the private appellation of Pochahontas, this last having been merely titular. It is well known that Powhatan was the title of the great chief, and that his individual name was Wahunsonacock. John Randolph, Sr., of Roanoke, father of John of Roanoke, the orator, resided some time at Matoax and died there in 1775. His widow, (whose maiden name was Frances Bland,) married secondly St. George Tucker, whereby Matoax fell into his possession, and he came to live there during the revolutionary war. January ing the following inscription: 5th, 1781, upon the approach of the British towards Petersburg, Mr. Tucker was compelled, suddenly, to remove his lady from Matoax, she having been but five days mother to Henry St. George Tucker. John Randolph, it has been said, alluded to this in near Hampton: Congress, upon occasion of replying to Mr. Tucker then likewise a member, thus, "The first time, sir, I can recollect having the pleasure of meeting with that gentleman, we were trying to get out of the way of the British."

John Randolph (the orator) was, as I believe, not born at Matoax, but certainly passed his boyhood there. It is said that, in after years, when involved in the turmoil of politics, he was heard to recur with fond regret, to his early days spent at Matoax, and in particular to his angling amusements there.

To the East of the site of Matoax house, on a rising ground, under a clump of oaks, are to be seen the tombstones of the parents of John Randolph, the orator, from which the flollowing inscriptions have been copied :

Johannes Randolph. Arm.
Ob. xxviii Octo.
MDCCLXXV

Æt xxxiv

Non ossibus urna, nec mens

Virtutibus absit.

[Translated.]

John Randolph Esq died 28th October 1775 aged 34. Let not a tomb be wanting to his ashes, nor memory to his virtues.

those of his Lady, in a similar sarcophagus, bearTo the right of Washington's remains, repose

"MARTHA, CONSORT OF WASHINGTON."

From the burying-ground on Pembroke farm,

Here lyes ye body of John Nevill Esq Vice-Admiral of His Majesty's fleet and commander in chiefe of ye squadron cruising in ye West Indies, who died on board ye Cambridge, 17 day of August, 1697, in the ninth yeare of the reign of King William ye third, aged 57 years.

ye

This Stone was given by his Excellency Francis Nicholson Esq Lieutenant & Governor General of Virginia in Memory of Peter Heyman esq Grandson to Sir Peter Heyman of Summerfield in ye county of Kent-he was collector of the customes in ye lower district of James River and went voluntarily on board the king's Ship Shoreham, in Pursuit of a pyrate who greatly infested this coast-after he had behaved himself 7 hours with undaunted courage, was killed with a small shot, ye 29 day of April 1700. In the engagement he stood next the Governor upon the Quarter deck and was here honorably interred by his order.

The two stones from which the above were transcribed, are of black marble, lying flat on the ground near each other, being six feet long, and three feet wide, and each surmounted with a coat of arms.

Of the capture of the pirate referred to, Beverley, in his history of Virginia, gives a circumstantial account.

Epitaph, copied from a marble slab, inserted in [and Sir Thomas Lunsford Kt, in memory of whom this

the wall of the old church at Williamsburg.

Near this marble lyes ye Hon'ble Daniel Parke of ye county of Essex, Esq, who was one of his ma'ties counsellors and sometime Secretary of the Colony of Virginia. He dyed ye 6th of March Anno 1679. His other felicities were crowned by his happy marriage with Rebbecka the daughter of George Evelyn of the county of Surry, Esq. He died the 2d of January Anno 1672 at long Ditton, in ye county of Surry and left behind him a most hopefull progeny.

Epitaph copied from the old church at Williamsburg.

MDCCLII.

Inscribed to the memory of Doctor William
Cocke, an English physician, born of
reputable parents MDCLXXII at Sudbury
in Suffolk & educated at Queen's
College Cambridge. He was learned
& polite, of undisputed skill in his profession,
of unbounded generosity in his practice,
which multitudes yet alive can testify.
He was many years of the Council & Secretary
of State for this Colony in the reign
of Queen Anne & King George.
He died suddenly sitting a judge
upon the bench of the General Court
in the Capitol.

His Hon friend Alex'r Spotswood Esq
the Gov'r with the principal gentlemen
of the country attended his funeral &
weeping saw the corps interred at the

West side of the alter in this Church.

The Virginia Coat of Arms.-There were three designs for a Coat of Arms of Virginia proposed, one by Dr. Franklin, another by M. De Cimetiere of Philadelphia, the third by George Wythe. This last was adopted. The figures were taken from Spence's Polymetis. The Coat is as follows:

marble is placed by order of Philip Ludwell Esq [Son] of
the said Thomas Ludwell, Esq, in the year 1727.
C. C.

Petersburg, Va., 1843.

LAKE GEORGE.

It was about an half hour after sunset, one of the finest days in August, that I alighted at the Lake House," from the Saratoga stage covered with dust and disappointment. We had left the springs soon after breakfast and made twenty-seven miles of the sandiest road I ever remember encountering. The way-bill had promised a more expeditious ride, and we had wished to see Lake George burnished with the shifting splendors of the sun's golden decline. But so it was. Stage agents are sanguine, the Swiftsure was a misnomer, and we probably arrived with better appetites for supper in consequence.

My first glimpse of the Lake was from the top of the coach (I always ride with the driver,) on a gentle eminence some three quarters of a mile from Caldwell. What had before been to me but an exquisite engraving in the scenery of America was now a beautiful reality, stretching away, engirdled by mountains, as far as the eye can reach in the fading hues of twilight. I had little time, however, for observation. Rattle went the stage with the rapidity it assumes in entering a village, and in ten minutes more, the waiters at the hotel were making with the clothes-brush as many sixpences as usual.

The traveller, in New-York, is struck with the never-ending variety of its lovely landscapes, at one time presenting the blue, bold majesty of the Virtue, the genius of the Commonwealth, dressed like an Catskills, at another, the undulating region of the Amazon, resting on a spear with one hand, and holding a Genesee. On its western border he is overpowered sword with the other, and treading on Tyranny, represen ted by a man prostrate, a crown fallen from his head, a bro- with the indescribable sublimity of stupendous ken chain in his left hand and a scourge in his right. In Niagara, while to the north, the St. Lawrence is the exergon, the word Virginia over the head of Virtue, and winding through his "Thousand Islands." The underneath "Sic semper tyrannis." On the reverse, a group; glassy loveliness of the Hudson, contrasted with Libertas with her wand and Pileus in the middle; on one the wildness of its banks and highlands, bas eliside, Ceres with the Cornucopia in one hand, and an ear of wheat in the other; on the other side, eternitas with the Globe cited from some tourists a warmer admiration than and Phoenix. In the exergon, " Deus nobis hæc otia fecit." the castellated Rhine. Everywhere throughout In October 1779, an act was passed by the Virginia Assembly, authorising the foregoing to be engraved, only changing the motto on the reverse to Perseverando.

Inscription taken from the yard of the Old Church at Williamsburg. Epitaph of Thomas Ludwell, Esq.

the broad dominions of the Empire State, we feel
the force of Bishop Berkeley's couplet, that

"art by Nature seems outdone,
And fancied beauties by the true."

The sun was just dissipating the mist which hung above the tree-tops, as if detained by their branches, when I arose and looked out of the window the morning after my arrival. The prospect was enUnder this marble lieth the body of Thomas Ludwell Esq. chanting. Below, the lake lay like a sheen of Secretary of Virginia, who was born at Bruton, in the county silver, the dark mountains mirrored on its surface. of Somerset, in the kingdom of England and departed this life in the year 1698 and near this place lye the bodies of The village seemed reposing in the stillness of Richard Kemp Esq, his Predecessor in ye Secretary's office, primeval solitude, a chosen spot where man might

retire from the turmoil of cities and the agitation | a continued discharge of artillery. The rumbling of conflicting interests to meditate in silence. But noise leaped I was interrupted in my reflections by the breakfast bell. So I went down and ate heartily of trout taken two hours previous from the blue depths

of their native element.

"From peak to peak the rattling crags among," when suddenly it died away and some seconds intervened, followed by an explosion, apparently at a great distance, and as loud as at first.

At 8, A. M., we embarked on a little steamer One would suppose that by the margin of Lake of graceful proportions to ascend the lake: we, George, the turbulent passions of men would be that is, a party consisting of four Southern gentle-softened and subdued; that he must be callous, inmen en route for Canada, an eminent clergyman of New-York City, a family from New-England and a Northern youth just from the recitations of the Lecture-Room,

"Ten precious souls and all agog

To dash through thick and thin."

deed, who feels not "an impulse from a vernal wood," and who could disgrace humanity by his offences in view of such exquisite scenery.

But no rock breaks upon the eye, that is not intimately connected with some legend of battle, or story of crime. Here were fought engagements On the whole, it was perhaps the most sociable of the most sanguinary character. The butchery set that was ever thrown together by accident. of Montcalm was enacted near the sweetest cove of The scenery, on the Lake, becomes more and the Lake and the shrieks of the slaughtered maimore bold as you ascend. The views change as den, Jane McRea, for mercy rang through the with the rapidity of phantasmagoria. Wildness woods which surround it. Deeds, which are withand serenity seemed blended together in sweet out a parallel in history for atrocity, were here of union. When the French settled in the neighbor- frequent occurrence in the old French war. hood, they gave this Lake the name of Sacrament, A book is kept on the steamboat for the contrifrom the singular purity of its waters, which they butions of travellers, which contains much that is used for the purposes of the chapel and made poetical, and more that is ridiculous. . Our colle"holy" by the Catholic Ritual. The idea is scarce-giate friend was deeply engaged in its perusal, ly less poetic than the Indian fancy that, like the and pointed out a jeu d'esprit, at which he was much pool of Bethesda, Lake Horicon extended a heal- diverted. Some wag, as an instance of the bathos, ing and sanative influence over those who bathed had written, "Tourist gaze with me into this emein it. Surely if the fountain of rejuvenescence be rald Lake and say-can you see anything green." ever discovered, its stream cannot be more pellucid. The reply of some other wit was "Yourself reThe pebbly bottom could be seen frequently from flected there." We added our quota to the bulky the deck of the steamboat as we glided along, and volume for the amusement of those who should the fish were sporting in conscious security around come after us. us. To the intrinsic beauty of this placid expanse was added all the grandeur which mountains ever infuse into a picture. Towering several hundred feet above the gleam of the water, they serve to remind us forcibly of our own insignificance, and inspire

Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue sky and in the mind of man;”

which leads us from the music of the ripple and
the sublimity of the lofty crag to the contemplation
of HIM who made them all.

The sail, occupying three hours over a distance of thirty-six miles, was one that I shall not easily forget. May the utilitarian spirit of improvement (?) erect no factories to mar the banks of Horicon, but in America let

Each lake and rill,
Renowned in song and story,
In unimagined beauty shine,
Nor lose one ray of glory."

"HOW CHEERING THE THOUGHT!" What struck me particularly, on Lake George, ham and have been set to appropriate music, by Professor The first two of the following stanzas are by Cunningwas its tideless tranquillity. Its 365 Islands are Webb of New-York. The last four stanzas have been covered with verdure to the brink, a sufficient indi-added by a Southern gentleman, under the inspiration of cation that it maintains invariably the same level an accomplished young lady, who thought the song too and is never ruffled by waves. The water-lily abrupt in its termination.—[Ed.

expands her snowy petals on the bosom of the lake and seems to spread out a fairy carpet. It is said, that when wintry winds are howling around the adjacent hills, the Lake is still as ever, and so continues until locked up by the fetters of frost. Near the northern extremity is the remarkable echo. A swivel was fired and the effect was like

VOL. IX-88

"How cheering the thought that the spirits in bliss,
Will bow their bright wings to a world such as this;
Will leave the bright joys of the mansions above,
To breathe o'er our bosoms some message of love.
"They come; on the wings of the morning, they come,
Impatient to bear some poor wanderer home;
Some pilgrim to snatch from this stormy abode,
And lay him to rest in the arms of his God."