splinters about them. How gloriously will he infold | is favorable. There is no bone broken, and away I go them, and cloak their dusky bark with an armor as upon my back as gently as a sleigh spinning along with pure as the crystal of the spring. Two months hence, four in hand. I heard that wicked urchin's mirth as my and the buds will cluster upon those boughs, and the heels slipped from under me, and as I glide majestically wild birds hide themselves in the fragrant leaves-the along, I hear his splintering approach-he shoots by gentle breath of May will whisper to them, and the me like an arrow, and a broad grin is upon his handsoft sun will rejoice amid their verdant foliage; but will some face. He has my blessing, bright boy, and they then wear an aspect so lovely as that with which though I may stumble frequently in life, may thy they are now bedecked? Like ten thousand chande-course be as it was this morn, happy and secure. He liers of diamond spars flashing every ray from the light, brought me my umbrella, and has brushed the ice from the limbs throw out their glassy tracery upon the sky, my back. and the wind that whistles through them, clatters them together with a soft and singular sound. The grass is prouder to-day than it has been for a long and weary time-it is stiff in its conceit; and should the old cow that slided down the hill just now, attempt to clip it, how it will pierce her nose with its sharp and beautiful spear. The grass is in its panoply of silver mail, and is ready to tilt against anything. Now it is more beautiful than the lily of the valley, and it lifts its head that the wind may tread over it and hear its mellow song. As I wend up the avenue, hundreds of boys fly past me on their skates, for the pavements and roads are all covered with the ice. Here it is safer walking, for they have roughened the surface with their fluted irons, and I pace along as merry as the rest. Like an alderman picking his way to a turtle dinner, see that solemn steed, how he minces his steps, and hear him how he snorts, as a flying skater, like a summer swallow-bird, flashes before his frost-webbed eyes, and his poor rider shakes his whip at the boy, who chuckles in his sleeve, and returns to the attack like a Bedouin Arab of the Desert. The blacksmith's shop is crowded with company, and the beaded perspiration falls from his forehead and hisses on the glowing iron. The two white horses are to be frosted first, for they belong to Mr., and he wants them to pay a visit of some importance to the The horses poke their bony heads out at the stabledoor and snuff the cool air, and shake their trembling ears as the sleet darts between them. Armed with my cane, and wrapped in my coat, I step forth to dare the whistling messengers from the clouds. Whew! How they scatter themselves over my face and cut their horizontal way over the tips of my ears. I place my faith-President. The blacksmith, with a nonchalant air, ful cane carefully in the ice, else away I would dart and roll over, to the edification of every market-woman that might feel herself secure in woollen straps passed under the soles of her shoes. Progressing along with all the apparent infirmity of age, though I am but in my younger youth, I reach at last the crowning point of my toil-to ascend that knoll on this side and descend it on the other, is like the passage of the Alps. snatches up the huge foot of an honest cartman's horse, who earns his bread by his daily toil, and hammers away right merrily upon him. The white servant of the great man has to pocket the insult, but his turn will come next. Thanks, honest smith! The poor wood-carrier will bless you this night, when he pours his earnings into his wife's hand, and sends his eldest boy out to buy milk for the evening coffee. I stand by a man who is digging lustily away at ice breaks off in cakes, and he draws forth the last evening's paper. He will chop logic over the sage editorial; for bent must he be on learning, that would thus stand in the shivering air, and pick two inches deep in ice for an evening's journal. The editor was highly complimented by the labor. How the hours wear on-how slowly the hands point upon the face of my time-piece, and yet how swiftly do our thoughts mount upon the four winds, and seek the hearthstone scenes of our friends. Alas! that they are distant from us. Warily my cane is placed, as if I trod upon the lof-something beneath the sleet: chop-chop-chop-the tiest summit of Mont Blanc, and saw beneath me the deep glaciers wherein 'tis almost death to gaze; I stick the point of my square-toed boots into the ice and clamber up. The steep is won-but now for the descent. A wild boy on his skates dashes past me, and away he goes like a rail-car, down the steep; he has passed the fence corner, and the rogue has stopped on his iron heels, to watch the descent of Bonaparte. Lord how the wind whistles around me, and how smooth and clear looks the shining declivity-there is not the slightest shrub to break the monotonous frigidity of the view, nor the grateful furrow of a cartwheel, and down that inclined plane go I must. Shall I sit down and slide it out? The laughing eyes of the skater, peeping over the fence, forbids the idea. The work is com-its icy sword. menced-the cane once more planted-the umbrella The night draws on apace-slowly the curtain falls, poised above my head; for the sleet storm is pouring upon us all in feathery glory, and I am off. It is in vain that I try the slide the equilibrium of my boyhood is gone, and the just precision of my eye, from want of practice, fails me at this momentous crisis. A slip-mercy-and all is over. My heels have kicked defiance to the clouds, and my head has smitten with an audacious force its mighty mother. The umbrella inflated with its own conceits has fluttered away, and is beyond my reach. But I am down, and the occasion We hear the wind chuckling around the gable-ends of the houses, and almost screaming with delight, when it cuts a corpulent biped across the bridge of the nose with and dim and indistinct sneak on the dying moments of the day-the grass has not bent an inch, and the tall trees shake their heads ominously, as much as to say, "We'll have a cold time of it out here to-night." Where are your elegant blankets that the gods have sent you? Will the mice stir abroad to-night? The cat is rolled up in her night-clothes and purs away like an old crone spinning wool. The wiry-headed dog barks ever and anon in his sleep, for he is haunted by visions of sacked towns and dismantled larders. gold!"* hold; Your diadems, ye kings! bring here,—the jewell'd crowns ye Oh! how the wind bellows without-"discoursing | Ye counsellors of earth!' come forth, 'ye princes who have most eloquent music." The shutters are fastened-the doors are not locked, for some sufferer may knock, and I would not deny him the comfort of my blazing fire. The curtains are not drawn down in such a night as this, for many a poor houseless wretch passing by and seeing all dark, would pass on, and he might find his bed in the deep hollow a few yards beyond my door. The sleet day has ended in a cold and starry night. The fretted limbs are swaying about in the powerful blast, and as yet I have heard of no accidents. The boys could have met with none, for they were not forced to the deep waters for their skating frolic; and though they, doubtless, have had some delightful tumbles, they are none the worse for that. Fine fellows, how soon the skates are thrown aside, after their first appearance at the barber's. Yet this fair pageant soon must fade before the breath of noon; avail. What though the sun so soon must melt this frost work and its He speaks them into life again, who rides amid the storms; In tears the vision melts away, 'the baseless fabric' falls. I too, could shed some tears, alas! that this sweet scene is For scenes as sweet, it brings to mind, which fled away as fast. * Job, chap. 3d. THE SLEET. Awake, awake, the sun is up, awake and sally forth, The earth is robed in dazzling white, each tree is hung with And diamonds in ten thousand shapes are hanging from their stems. Each bush and every humble shrub, with precious stones is strung, And all the purest, brightest things, by handfuls round are The em'raid! and the amethyst! the topazes! behold! The chrysolite and jasper see, and that bright Sardine stone The cedar! ah thou favor'd tree! in scripture it is told And showering down a world of gems that sparkle as they fly. The lofty oak-the hundred limb'd Briareus of the trees! But time would fail to tell of all that bright and starry host The meanest thing-the most deform'd-the dry and sapless bough, The bramble rude, the rugged thorn, are pure and spotless now. ILLUSTRATIONS OF A SCIENCE. By the author of 'Love at the Shrines,' &c. THE ANIMAL MAGNETIZER. How the following wild and eccentric story came into my possession, is a matter of no great import. It came by the right of inheritance, among a golgotha of garret furniture, such as trunks and boxes of all sizes and of every form. On opening one of them, I was struck by a singular looking roll of paper tied up very neatly with a faded piece of brocade, and it was not long ere I found that the writing was that of a very celebrated ancestor of my family, and I set to work to decypher the outré letters, for the benefit of your readers—simply remarking that I have excluded all portions of the record, that appertain to the scientific part of animal magnetism; apprising the general reader however of the fact, that in the early days of the art, the operations were accompanied with music-this remark is relevant to the understanding the story. THE STORY. It is night-the weary wind pants around my windows-the fire glows in the hearth, and every now and then, a small cloud of smoke puffs down the chimney, driven out by the blast. It is a sad night, and the world is hushed, and the deep silence is only broken by the baying of the mastiff chained with a double chain to the portal. How mysterious and awful are these gigantic walls— those dark recesses-and that old and rusted armor | sence. I stood upon the threshold of his room-he hanging upon iron nails, how it fills me with ideas of the glorious past. I am now an old man-the silver is about my head, and I am not what I used to be, when I bounded along the liveliest of all the proud ones, that have sunk away forever. But why should I pause upon the threshold of that which I promised you I would relate? Often and often have I put you off with promises, and now as I feel the cold shiver of old age, I think it high time to gratify your curiosity. In this brief record, you will find ample materials for wonder and admiration, and when I shall have been gathered to my fathers, read it to your children, as a singular event in the life of one of their ancestors. rose at my appearance. I could not move-for his eyes, large, dark and brilliant, were riveted upon me. There was a fascination in them like a snake's-so surpassingly beautiful were they. His forehead was high, white, and without the trace of a wrinkle, and his dark ringlets fell back upon his shoulders, and added to the wildness of his countenance-and yet he was gentle in every look-a languor--a softness, almost an effeminacy, which soothed the abrupt and startling effect of a first view of him. He spoke to me, and his voice was melodious as the softest music--so low-so gentle. I became acquainted with him, and found him melancholy but not morose-but he looked as we fancy the poets look-those priests of nature. I saw him perform his magnetic wonders on multitudes, and he seemed to sway them as a god. They breathed low and softly when he spoke--their limbs quivered when his large eyes were fixed upon them, and when he moved about the room their hearts would pant like the bosom of love It is a dreary task to go back to the days of our youth-almost sinful in age to chill the sunshine of such a memory, with his breath iced and feeble; but yet for your sake, my beloved, I will go back upon the dreary travel, and conjure up once more the emotions of-by a motion of his hand he gave them life, by a my youth, and stir the smouldering cinders in my heart. It was your mother of whom I shall speak. Her character was gentle, pure and credulous. She had no guile, and when I wooed her, she did not shun me, but met my advances as nature prompted, which was modesty and truth to her. She was to me life-souldivinity. I sighed for the morning, that it might bring me to her presence-for the night, that I might worship her in all that glorious impregnation of mystery incident to my country. When I won her it was in the spring, and I remember it so well, so wonderfully well. I see again the moon and stars shining down upon the short crisp grass, and silvering every blade with a rich and fretted scabbard. I see once more the leaves trembling in the gentle breeze, the dark old trees beneath which we used to sit and count the throbbings of our hearts, one against the other. She was guileless as she was beautiful; she loved and was beloved; there was a tacit understanding between our hearts--they had met in the yearning confidence of their strength, and whispered calmly and thoughtfully to each other-there was nothing unexplained. Truth was the sun; the several and many thoughts common between us, the stars to our little world. We moved together, but not apart from the rest-we loved the world, and had our friends-we danced and we sung and whirled along the giddy mazes of society, but we had our world-one single step and we were in it, and it was a paradise. glance he could palsy them into a livid and ghastly corpse. Where was the magic of this wonderful being? I watched him like an eagle, but there was ever the same subdued manner about him. He glided across the floor like a woman in a sick chamber; he looked at you, and your very soul bounded and leaped beneath the swimming glance of the philosopher. His habits were secluded and studious. He pored over large tomes and rich-clasped books, and at times his brow would darken as if a tempest of wrath was brooding over him, and again his color would revive, as if ideas like rose leaves, had expanded in his soft and enchanted soul. I became a regular attendant at his rooms, and witnessed some strange scenes in the course of his practice. It was a weird and ghastly occupation, that of this early magnetizer. He so calm and melancholy-the patient so pale, haggard and ghostlike; and there I have seen him stand gazing on the pallid face until the tears would rush into his eyes, and his whole frame would tremble as with an ague fit. From a deep interest in the philosopher, I became a warm student of the philosophy. It excited and filled me with visionary thoughts, but I had never allowed myself to be magnetized. An awful dread of putting on the semblance of death prevented me. I did not wish that man should see how I looked when I should be laid out on the final plank-for I knew they would tell Imogen, and her heart would be filled with horror. A shudder would benumb every fibre of my body at the In those days a wild theory had been started by some of our many dreamers, and all Germany had been tor-idea of the experiment, and an indistinct shadow waved tured by the cruel and hideous doctrine. Crowds followed its professors through the streets, and mystery and majesty and a dreadful awe hung upon their actions and their words. The science was one that had never before been heard of it broke suddenly over the heads of our learned men like a thunderbolt, and swept onward into every avenue of the public curiosity. I shared the common wonder, and in my ardent spirit, there was awakened a most painful desire to master its secrets. In this state of mind, the city in which I lived was visited by one of these strange beings-these teachers of the dark and weird lore, and I hastened to his pre me back. But I tottered towards the trial; I longed with an eager desire which maddened me to restrain, and yet I dreaded the result. Was it the secret infiuence of that mysterious man, conveyed through those strange and gloomy eyes, that swayed me to and fro? I fancied that I frequently saw him gazing at me with an earnest look. At this singular period of my life, old impressions returned upon me with renewed force. One in particular, which from its horror, and from the effect it now exercised, I will relate. It stalked before me whenever I entered the magnetizer's—I heard its clanking bones-I smelt its odor of the grave.-When I was a boy some ten years old, an uncle who was a medical man, lived in my father's house, and was ad- [ him to the combat-he was to strike into a trance the dicted to the relation of marvellous stories, many which body and the soul, and I rushed onward with a feverhave been since published. He would talk of goblins and ish anxiety to witness the grand and crowning scene of spectres until the blood of both old and young would the sorcerer. tingle in their veins, and he completed his conquest Suddenly I heard the notes of a soft and voluptuous over my imagination. I slept in a small bed at the foot air. It was a mysterious voice that gave it vent. It of my uncle's, and long after the family had retired, he seemed to arrest the power of respiration, and a faintwould continue to pour into my ears his dreadful adven-ness overcame me--it was as if the fragrance of Heatures. On one night in winter, we had all been shiver- ven had found a tongue to syllable its sweets. The ing with the cold and my uncle's stories, that I kissed melody, for it was more than music, came from a darkmy parents and without a light went to my uncle's ened part of the magnetizer's house. room. There were a few chunks burning in the hearth, sufficient to light the frightened boy to bed. I was soon undressed and stood over my little bed, and as I made the attempt to hide beneath the bed-clothes, I struck against something hard—it rattled with a hollow sound, and starting back, the ruddy light of the fire streamed full upon the spectacle. I sprung upon the floor, rushed down the stairs, and bursting into the room, shrieked, "The Skeleton! the Skeleton!" My uncle had placed this object in my bed, had laid it out with all its bones and eyeless skull and stinking skin scarce dry, to frighten me! How strong then was the impression of that object upon my mind, when after seeing others in the pallid sleep, I leave to your imagination. Morbidly aroused to penetrate the science, I continued to pore over every work that touched upon the subject. I thought frequently that I might unveil the awful art by tracing it to magic, and the character of its professor would have given color to the charge. He seldom or never spoke to the crowd, but there was a stern and haughty reserve, that forbade familiarity and inspired the spectators with something akin to fear. To me, however, he was generally kind, but no information would he impart. Inscrutable-dark and obscure, he stood among the crowd and exercised his power as he pleased. Meantime my love ran on smoothly and with greater depth and fervor, without those common obstructions, deemed requisite to give its monotonous glory a piquancy and zest. Of course you will imagine that much of our conversation turned on the engrossing subject of magnetism, and she listened fearfully to my comments upon its subtle mysteries. One evening we determined to visit the magnetizer's together, though I did not remember at the time of forming the engagement, that I had made a professional appointment with a sick friend. I told her the urgency of this visit, and proposed that she should go on to the magnetizer's with her cousin Ernest, where I would meet her in an hour. We parted, and ere that hour had flown away, I had closed the eyes of an old and dear companion—he had died in torture. Filled with the gloomy impressions from the melancholy scene through which I had just passed, and whose horrid details I will not shock you with repeating, I directed my steps to the room of the magnetizer. The torches were lit along the streets, and the mighty wing of night hung heavily above-a few stragglers passed me, and I hastened on. The cool air in part revived me. I saw the light shining through the tall windows of the exhibition room. It was his gala-night, on which he proposed to exercise to the full the powers that he possessed. The skeptics had dared I was arrested, and my heart went slowly and sickly down, and burning thoughts, and deep and languishing yearnings of love took possession of me. A dimness was overspreading my eyesight, and I could hear no other sound but that bewitching voice-that divinity of solitude, and I saw no other object but that dark and solemn house. A numbness seized upon my limbs, and I was fainting, when gradually the air grew fainter and fainter; it appeared to sob, and then all was still as the tomb. The trance was broken. The sickening, but delicious sensations with which I had been filled, departed, and I bared my forehead to the cold breath of the winds, and proceeded. Would that I had never waked from that glorious enraptment!-would that I could have been arrested and fixed forever in the world of melody created by that voice! I entered the Hall of Experiment, but every space was crowded. I climbed to the topmost bench of the amphitheatre to see where Imogen and her cousin were. Several dark looking men, on whose shoulders I placed my impatient feet, glared at me with threatening eyes. I gained at last a position where I could command a view of the entire assembly. I glanced eagerly around among the dense mass for my beloved, but nowhere could I find her. I gnashed my teeth, and the blood went swiftly through my body. At length, in a distant part of the room and near to the magnetizer, I saw them sitting together. Oh God! how beautiful she looked! Her auburn locks were parted on her ample brow, and fell in ringlets on her shoulders; a delicate rose was entwined in her hair, and her cheeks were glowing. Had she too been spelled by that superhuman melody? If she had heard that glorious and voluptuous music, what had been her feelings? A cold shudder smote me through the heart, when I saw her dark-eyed cousin gaze earnestly in her face, and then his eyes fell with an abstracted and vacant air, and he appeared absorbed in thought. Had he too been poisoned by the intoxicating melody? He was transcendently handsome, and he had a languid look, that is more dangerous to the female heart than all the flashing eyes and eloquent tongues in the world. I could not reach the pair, and terrible emotions crowded to my brain when I reflected upon the effect of that terrible but delicious symphony. I burned with an inward and almost frantic fire, and several times I was upon the eve of screaming aloud at him, when he cast those baneful and languid looks upon her face. I tore my hair in my silent, but tormenting rage, and there I was doomed to witness the exaggerated scene, without the power of making them know that I was watching them like a hungry serpent. I was absorbed in the one vision of the hated cousin and the beloved girl. I saw him speak to her with his mouth close to her ear. [ face. With a blow I struck him to the ground, and What he said was urged vehemently. She smiled tim- grappled the arch-fiend by the throat. When he turnidly. Oh that smile! it dispelled every gloom. She ed from his pallid and piteous victim upon me, his shook her head, but he opened his large--his lustrous and splendid eyes, and gazed reprovingly and beseechingly into hers, and in a moment an alarmed and dubious expression flitted over her face, and she averted her look. I could have plunged my dagger into his heart, but I trembled and stood still, while a murmur ran through the crowd, and suddenly the Enigma stood upon the platform. He was clothed in a full suit of black velvet, and his forehead shone like a star; his hair fell down in long wavy curls, and his face was pale and his eye dim as an ashen corpse—but even in death beautiful. Had he been communing with that melodious being, and was he just from the conference? A pin might have fallen and been heard among that absorbed and entranced assembly, and for a moment my attention was diverted from Imogen and her cousin Ernest, and directed in concentrated curiosity towards the operator. There seemed a sound from afar off, like the dying cadence of a harp, but none heard it distinctly, yet all were startled at its mystery, and then all was still as the grave. eyes glared-his hands were clenched together like the talons of a bird of prey, and he uttered in a sepulchral tone my name. "Restore my Imogen," I cried, "or I strike you dead!" He smiled, and I waved my dagger over his head. His eye followed my gesture, and quick as thought, while the crowd were rushing like a dark and giant wave towards us, that godlike voice from the distance, broke upon my ear. My arm dropped-the dagger fell from my grasp-a clammy perspiration oozed from every pore. I reeled from the intensity of intoxicated sensations, and leant against the wall. The music continued, and with it seemed to come a perfume that filled the whole room. Not a person moved, but all looked on in fearful amazement at the wonderful spectacle. There sat my beloved, my adored Imogen, as I have described her, with the terrible sorcerer towering proudly and triumphantly over all. The music paused but for a second, and yet that second was a life to menot a moment to lose, but I darted forward and regaining my dagger, I plunged it into the body of my foe. I seized Imogen by the hand and tried to wake her. I once more turned towards Ernest and Imogen, and To all appearance she was dead-not a word—not a she was deadly pale, while he was flushed and his ac-sigh-not a movement even of a muscle. I called aloud tions were agitated and nervous. Then was renewed to the bleeding Magnetizer to reillume the victim of within me the hell that I had before felt. his art, but he replied not. The magnetizer turned his full eyes from the crowd towards the twain-they were sitting near to him, and a sudden change was visible on his face. In front of him were the skeptics, or philosophers, who had taunted him to this final trial, and every solemnity had been put in requisition to sustain him in his hour of need. I tried to force my way through the crowd. I could have torn them to pieces, but they moved not, and so I was constrained to be a mere spectator of that scene, which taxed every fibre of my heart to bear. Suddenly the magnetizer waved his hand upwards and gazed upon Imogen. She was not looking at him at that moment, but no sooner had he made the gesture, than with a quick start she turned towards him. I was struck mute with horror and amaze-my tongue clove to the roof of my mouth, and I could neither call aloud nor make a sign. Horrible sight! In a second, like a stroke of lightning the truth flashed across my mind, and I saw that Ernest had staked his hope of success with Imogen upon the magnetic influence of the master. He alone could rescue her. He who had darkened her spirit could revive the soul, and give it back to life and love. I knelt by his side-I raised him in my arms-I pointed to Imogen, and begged him to wave his hand once more, and wake her from her ghastly sleep. He smiled bitterly, and shook his head with a ferocious smirk of exultation. Driven to despair, I dashed him away from me, and cast myself upon my knees before the inanimate body of my betrothed; but I gazed upon the vacant eye, and called to the deafened ear. While kneeling before her, I heard a scream, and then a confused murmur of alarm, and the next moment I saw the figure of a dark and majestic woman standing above the magnetizer. She stooped and raised his head upon her knee and whispered to his ear. He slowly raised his eyes to Imogen and waved his hand. The eyes of my beloved moved-her lips unclosed— she drew a long breath, and rising from her chair fell into my opened arms. The crowd, held back through fear and superstition, now raised a loud shout of joy, and when I looked round for the strange being who had wrought this sudden change, I saw nothing but a small black pool of blood. The enchanter and the enchantress had left the hall. Here the manuscript is continued with scientific ar The gestures were continued, when all at once the powers of speech and motion came back to me, and I shrieked aloud to the dreaded sorcerer to stop. He did not appear to notice my summons, but proceeded. Again I shrieked and swore that I would strike him dead if he did not desist. Imogen did not hear me !guments upon the science of magnetism, which may She sat like a statue hewn out of the solid rock, with her eyes like those of a corpse, and her mouth open. Her cheeks were deadly pale. hereafter be published. At present they are too wild and singular for this age. So prone is the youth of our country to indulge in daring speculation, that I will not feed their morbid appetite by a present disclosure. I was possessed at that moment with the strength of a giant. I rushed forward-I trampled under foot those whom I overthrew-I swept with my arms a passage through that solid mass, and stood by the side of the Petrarch declares that in his youth he saw the works magician. Ernest sprang to me, and we stood face to of Varro, and the second Decade of Livy. |