one effort in his behalf had been defeated, and there was none to make another.

He was to suffer at noon; so, at eleven o'clock, the sheriff entered his cell to prepare him for the tragedy. He found him in bed as usual, and utterly unconscious of the hair-hung sword above it; but he obstinately refused to rise. No entreaty sufficed to move. At length the jailer, remembering that one of the peculiarities he had manifested was a fierce desire for money, offered him a shilling if he would rise and dress himself. He instantly seized the coin, and was up and dressed in a twinkling. He very gladly accompanied his visiters into the air and sunshine, where he was speedily seized and choked to death, according to law. He probably had no idea of what was intended until the rope was around his neck, if even then.

An hour afterward, he was cut down for burial, when the shilling which had bribed him to rise was found clutched tightly in his right hand. Very likely, the gallows and its concomitants appeared to his glimmering mind only a contrivance to frighten or constrain him to surrender his precious treasure.

Two years afterward, the Doctor aforesaid was a passenger on a railroad two hundred miles from the scene of this tragedy, when he was drawn into conversation with two gentlemen, unknown to him -(strangers, apparently of the legal profession), — respecting the proper rank of this country in the scale of civilization. The lawyers placed it at the head of the nations, which the Doctor controverted, insisting that its true position was in the background. He admitted the great superiority of our institutions, but insisted on the harshness of our manners, the sordidness of our aims, and our general recklessness of human life, as evinced in our frequent and fatal casualties on land and water, our Lynch-law atrocities, street-fights, &c. &c. "Let me tell you what I have myself witnessed and taken part in, bearing on this subject," said he; and he proceeded to unfold the story of poor Teague's heedless trial, summary sentence, and brutal massacre, insisting that in no other country could a reputable judge be found to legalize and direct such a sacrifice. "And can you really contend," was his triumphant inquiry, at the close, "that a country where this tragedy was enacted without exciting

indignation, or even inquiry, has any claim to be placed at the head of Christian civilization? Is it not rather to be deemed intensely barbarian?"

Before he closed, the younger lawyer had evinced uneasiness, and a desire to interrupt the narration; but the Doctor, nevertheless, persevered to the end. Then the lawyer hastened to say, "Sir, let me introduce you to Judge Belknap, who presided on the trial of the homicide whose tragical end you have just described to us."

The Doctor was taken by surprise, but had no disposition to retract the truth. A few considerate sentences were exchanged between him and the judge, the latter expressing profound regret for the fatal mistake which had been committed, — and their ways parted.

Years rolled by, and Judge Belknap remained on the bench, honored, esteemed and useful; yet it is believed that he never again participated in a conviction of capital crime, without thoroughly and carefully satisfying himself, not merely that the offence had been committed by the prisoner at the bar, but that the latter was in such possession of his faculties as to be morally responsible for his actions,

and capable of realizing their nature and culpability. Would that the lesson thus impressively given to one minister of justice could be imparted to all his brethren, without involving the necessity of a repetition of his mistake and its tragical consequences!

DREAM-LAND.

BY HELEN RICH.

THERE is a land, a sunny land, where the spirit roams at will,

With sleeping vale, and solemn mount, and forestshaded hill;

There dwells no shadow on its plains, no storm upon

It is the spirit's pleasure-ground, the sweet Dream

land for me.

It has a sky, a soft blue sky, like eyes whose

glances play

Upon the heart when those dear orbs are smiling

far away.

There come no wailings on its air, no shrieks upon

its gale;

It is the holy realm of thought, that lies within the