with this fine poem, that he has not yet done justice | not so much copies of men, as the men themselves, to his talents, or chosen subjects most congenial that constitutes the peculiar charm of Mr. Thowith his tone of mind, or best suited to the develop-mas's prose writings. This talent of observation ment of his powers. The admirers of genius will therefore look with some anxiety towards the future direction of powers which have not been conducted into the channel to which they have already shown a natural tendency.

Although the writer has not seen a review, not even the briefest newspaper notice of "East and West," and cannot therefore determine the kind of reception it has received by the editorial corps and the reviewers, yet judging only from the work itself, and the opinions of many who have perused it, he is confident of its title to a fair share of popularity, which must, in some degree, however, be qualified, by the causes above stated, operating on fictions of the class to which this belongs. It is spirited and racy, enriched with fine thoughts, and abounds in admirable sketches of character. The style, though not elegant or studied, is bold, free and flowing, as if the author wrote with ease and rapidity.

has led him to study the characters of distinguished men; and insensibly created a taste for biography, which he has displayed in an eminent degree, in a popular biographical sketch of Wirt, published shortly after the death of this distinguished man. We will now conclude this article, which has insensibly grown to an unexpected length, with a brief sketch of Mr. Thomas's personal appearance, inasmuch as it is not the fashion now-a-a-days for authors to show themselves to their readers, like their olden time predecessors, en frontispice. He is about twenty-eight years of age, five feet nine inches in height, compactly built, and slightly inclined to be fleshy. His complexion is a healthy brown; his hair black and wavy, and is worn long and negligently about his temples. His forehead is straight and high, with the intellectual organs strongly developed. His eyebrows are square and full, and beneath them plays a pair of deep-set eyes of the keenest black, with a lively if not a laughing expression, in which mixed humor and penetration predominate. His nose is straight and faultless; his lips accurately chisseled, and remarkably flexile, and capable of expressing humor or sarcasm in a striking degree. The ruling expression of his face, which is that of a handsome, dark complexioned man, is good humor and intelligence, and is marked with decided intellect. His address is courteous and gentlemanly; his politeness, proceeding rather from the heart, than the observance of mere external forms. On account of the slight peculiarity before alluded to, which renders artificial aid indispensable, he walks with a stout cane, with one arm behind his back, and his face bent, as if in deep thought, on the pavement, at which times, his face wears that solicitous look often observable in men, who, like him, have from infancy been the martyr of severe physical suffering. As an author, Mr. Thomas has only to be taught by further experience the Perhaps the most prominent trait of Mr. Tho-natural tendency of his fine powers, to rank high mas's mind, is his perception and instinctive appre- among native American authors.

In briefly sketching the character of Mr. Thomas's mind, the poet and the novelist are too inseparably united to admit of their peculiar features being separately considered. As an observer of nature, he delights in the contemplation of the sublime and terrible, rather than the picturesque; choosing to spread the wings of his imagination and sail above the beetling crags, rather than fly through fairy dells, or hover in the shadowy grove. But he is not an enthusiastic admirer of "grassy meadows, breezy slopes, inspiring hills and mountain crags;" and will turn his back on the fairest scene, to seat himself in some quiet corner, if he be travelling, perchance in a steamer on the Ohio or Mississippi, to hold conversation with some "character," whom accident may have thrown in his way. It may be remarked, here, that his conversational talents are of the highest order; his voice agreeable, and his address and manners popular and prepossessing.

CURIOUS ELEMENTARY BOOK.

There exists a very curious little book in German,

to the humorous, and a passion for observing what he has emphatically termed "characters," he is at all times observant, and constantly deriving in this way, not only amusement to himself, but for his readers. Probably there is not a character, published at Leipzic in 1743, entitled "A new book of particularly the ruder ones, (for it is the unhewn the ABC in 100 languages, or fundamental instruction block, and not the polished column which forms for acquiring in the most tender youth not only German, Latin, French and Italian, but likewise the oriental subjects for his study,) in his novels, which is not and other languages." It contains, in fact, the alphabet drawn from living originals; who, at a public and first elements of 100 different languages, ancient table, in the street or highway, have unconscious- and modern. It was reprinted in 1748 and greatly augly sat for their portraits to this observing painter mented. The second edition contains the Lord's prayer of men and manners. It is this naturalness, this in 200 languages. It is by John Frederick Frits.

July 29.

A deer hunt. This morning "the hounds were un

through the square, baying in full chorus, with half a dozen young gentlemen, headed by Nimrod, who ever and anon blew a note on his horn to keep in the hounds,

ness, may yet be ever active within him. Such a one its sumptuousness, and trotted back to the Springs, finds a temple, an altar, a choral symphony, wherever on the whole quite pleased with my little excursion. the cope of Heaven arches over the retreats of nature, wherever the shade of the forest, the rippling of the streamlet, and the music of birds, invite to meditation, to reflection, to adoration of the gifts, and wonder-kennelled, all ripe for the chase," and came dashing ful order of Providence, and to the welling-up of those emotions, which, while they are irrespective of time and place, are as grateful in the sight of Him who looks upon the heart, as though they sprung from the stuc-all arrayed in proper trim for hunting the deer in the coed domes, the vaulted roofs, and Gothic arches of the proudest fanes erected by the hands of man. And where does nature keep Sabbath, if not here, in these pathless woods, -on the slope of these magnificent mountains, beneath these mild skies, and amid these sylvan shades, tuneful with the voices of a thousand birds, and soothing the spirit of the worshipper with the gentle flow of many brooks, musically gliding over the pebbles that lie below, glistening in the straggling sunbeam that finds its way through the overarching foliage?

At no great distance from this spot the sermon of the old blind preacher, described so touchingly by the late William Wirt of Virginia, in his celebrated "British Spy," was delivered. All will recollect that pathetic story: the woodland scene among the mountains,--the passionate eloquence of the preacher,—the raising of his sightless eyes to Heaven,--the description of the Saviour's sufferings,-the comparison between the death of Socrates and that of Christ,—and that glowing peroration, "Socrates died like a philosopher,--but Jesus Christ like a God!" That sermon was uttered in such a temple, and surrounded by such associations as I have imperfectly described. That temple was among these very mountains, and between their ridges reside the descendants of that old blind patriarch: and such were the recollections that have sanctified the day that has just passed, otherwise unmarked by any surrounding religious associations.

July 28.

neighboring mountains. It was a novel and a gallant
sight. The morning was clear and brilliant, and every
thing promised a merry excursion, and plenty of sport.
The huntsmen were mounted on fine horses, each car-
ried a gun or rifle, and off they went for the mountain, in
a southerly direction. Arrived at the haunts of the
game, the leader of the chase stationed a man at seve-
ral open passes or intervals among the mountains, who
was to watch the coming forth of the deer as he should
break cover, and bound for shelter across them to the
opposite thicket. The hounds were all this time on the
scent, and soon the game was afoot. The crack of
rifles was heard, and the deep baying of the hounds
was unintermitting. But, contrary to the usual good
fortune of Nimrod and his "merry men all," there was
no game struck, or if struck, it was but slightly, and not
skilfully enough to secure the prey.

"So letting the stricken deer go weep,
The hart ungalled play,"

the huntsmen returned, with no other satisfaction for
their morning's excursion, than a good ride, good exer-
cise, and the customary "treat" from the individual
who was so unfortunate as to make an unsuccessful
shot. Such is a stag hunt in the Alleghanies, and dif-
fering only from the most of them, in the important
particular, that the specimen furnished you was not
crowned with the usual success.

The Springs are still filling. Scores of applicants are turned away daily, and are quartered about in the neighborhood, ready at any moment to slip in, whenever the scales of Mr. Anderson's even-handed justice

An excursion to Lewisburg. This is a pleasant little village, distant from the White Sulphur about ten miles, and a pretty ride, often enjoyed by the residents here. With good horses and in a convenient phaeton, (a Bal-shall incline favorably. Among the last new arrivals timore friend's,) the journey was accomplished in little are large parties from South Carolina. Virginia, too, more than an hour and a half, through a lovely tract is on the qui vive. The neighboring Springs are pour. of country, the whole length of which was traversed ing in upon us their visitants, and the surrounding by the fine turnpike of which I have already said some country is full of quarantiners, waiting for admission. thing in commendation. We passed, and were passed Not a place in which to lay one's head can be had, inter and met by several vehicles, in which pleasure-parties parietes, and as to Dickson's, the Sweet Springs, "the to and from the Springs, below as well as above, from White House on the Hill," the Brick Tavern, and all the Sweet as well as the White Sulphur, were dashing the other suburbs of this place, numerous as they are, along the well graded road, all in high glee. Arrived they are overflowing with anxious expectants, (four beds at Lewisburg, I went over to the Court House, where in a room, and three in a bed,) who every morning turn the court of appeals was in session. This is the highest their longing, lingering look towards the paradise they tribunal in the state, and the chief justice, or president, may not enter. Some, more hardy than the rest, come is Henry St. George Tucker, to whom I have already boldly in, deposite their baggage on the piazza, borrow particularly alluded. There were one or two impor- a friend's room in which to dress, spend the day and tant cases expected to come on,-and the distinguished evening, and then sleep, or not sleep, heaven only Richmond barrister, Chapman Johnson, was there. But knows where, until the dawn of the day which is to the cases were postponed or settled, and I had not an admit them to a cabin in "Alabama Row," or "The opportunity of hearing, as I had hoped to do, the argu- Wolf." I have frequently seen recumbent forms upon ment of the learned counsel. It was a disappointment, the benches under the trees in the square, covered with but these are the lot of man, and I went back to the thick great-coats or cloaks, at midnight, apparently enhotel, enjoyed a dinner that would have surprised nine-joying sound repose in the still moonlight, undisturbed tenths of the country inn-keepers of New England, by save by a casual footstep or the occasional baying of

the awakened hounds. What will not people do to keep their place in the train of fashion and pleasure?

But few go away, compared with the number of arrivals. The pleasures of the place, the opportunity of social intercourse of a grade much higher and more agreeable than is usually enjoyed at watering places, the convenience of making pleasant excursions for miles around the Springs, as a common centre, attract and retain many more guests than the pleasure or the necessity of drinking the waters. Paradise and North Carolina Rows, present every evening a most attractive spectacle, the white piazzas filled with crowds of happy visiters, and vocal with hundreds of joyous voices. The seats beneath the trees at twilight are also well filled, and the dancers are beginning, as I write, to gather in the hall. The translucent clouds resting on the peaks of the mountains, have caught and reflected the last rays of the sun that has long since disappeared behind them, and are now softening from their yellow lustre into a thin curling mass of vapor, through which the stars are beginning to twinkle, and beneath which the new moon is bashfully sinking behind the hills. The new moon! If there be not in the modest beaming of that pale crescent the promise of midnight serenade, and of beauty's dream broken by the gentle breathings of flute and flageolet, perchance of manly voice, to the touch of the gay guitar,-there is no virtue extant in the legendary lore of astrology.

The evening air among these hills is damp and misty, and yet no one ever takes cold here. There seems to be a salubriousness even in the vapors which rise amid the mountains, and descend in showers or dews upon us in this happy valley. The truth is, these vapors, from the nature of the soil and the atmosphere, are not miasmatic nor impure. They rise from the pure bosom of our "gentle mother," and bear with them nothing that is not healthful, mild and salubrious; and it has actually come to be a popular belief in this region, that the night airs and night dews of the White Sulphur, are highly beneficial to invalids.

July 30.

I did not miscalculate on the gallantry and taste of the lovers at Spa. There were serenades last night, even as I predicted. Towards midnight I was wakened by a strain of sweet music, breaking in upon the stillness of night, and charming the air with melody. It proceeded from the band at present performing here, and was executed with taste and feeling. Soon a voice came stealing, in unison with the strain, upon my ear. It was breathed from the lips of some youth beneath a lady's window in Paradise Row, and it was with singular appropriateness of selection, that the serenader, in a mirthful and arch style of execution, commenced with "We're all a'noddin',"-following this introduction with "Oft in the Stilly Night," and closing his performance with "Farewell, but whenever you welcome the hour." Soon all was hushed, the tinkling of the guitar, the breathing of the flute, the warbling of the clarionet, the swell of the mellow horn, and the accents of the serenader, all died away upon the ear, and the fair objects of this graceful compliment were left to dream of the sounds to which they had been listening, just as the evening star was also pillowing itself upon the clear mountain top.

"Soft stillness and the night

Become the touches of sweet harmony.
The floor of Heaven

Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold.
There's not the smallest orb

But in his motion like an angel sings,

Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubim."

I was curious to see how this lovely place looked beneath the still and quiet cope of heaven, lighted only by the stars, at deep midnight; and finding it impossi ble to recover the sleep that had been broken by the serenaders, I walked forth into the open air, and commenced my midnight ramble. Before me stood the pavilion, imbosomed in foliage,—its white columns show. ing like marble in the clear starlight. The white cluster of stars that extends in a milky path across the heavens, was shedding down a soft and peculiar radiance upon the statue that presides over the fountain,-while a solitary lamp hung within, to light the casual visitant to the pure element that bubbles up beneath. I stooped to quaff the elixir; for I have learned, as all will learn who come and try, to love it as never did a devotee of Bacchus love the juice of the ruddy grape. I pursued my way refreshed, and followed the spring from its outlet to its course among the woods that hang over it, reflecting their heavy limbs in its translucent waters. It is a beautiful little stream, and pursues its steady, onward, undeviating, and perennial path, until it swells the current of the great Ohio in the west.

As I passed along this little river's bank, beneath the overarching woods, I suddenly roused the hounds, that lie in their kennel at my left. They had been tired with the day's chase, and were more quiet than usual. Indeed, I had not thought of my proximity to them, as I went on my silent way. But no sooner did they hear my footsteps near their domain, but as if by a unanimous concert of purpose, they rushed open-mouthed to the fence of their enclosure, and raised a baying, that reminded me of Virgil's description of the barking of Cerberus, on the descent of Eneas to Avernus. As my steps receded, they became quiet, or nearly so, an occasional short, sharp howl, alone testifying the unwillingness with which dogs as well as men submit to have their slumbers broken. I felt no compunction on that score, however, offsetting thereto many similar disturbances suffered on my own part, attributable to the agency of these very gentry. So, leaving them to reflect on the virtue and propriety of retributive justice as they best might, I pursued my walk.

The array of stars is a noble sight, even to the uninitiated in astronomy. The stars,-the same stars that on the plains of Shinar God bade his chosen patriarch Abraham to count as the number of his seed,-the reward of his faithfulness. The same stars beneath which Jacob lay, and dreamed that they formed the pavement upon which angels walked ;-the stars, the bright, the beautiful, the musical stars, that sang at nature's birth, and that sing ever in their spheres. The unloosed bands of the Pleiades, twinkling in their seven harmonious orbits,-the belted Orion,-the Serpent twining its lustrous folds between the Bears,—the lovely Lyra, on which you can almost fancy the symphonies of the heavenly choir are singing,-the Dogs, beautiful and more bright than those which poets fabled as accompanying Diana in her chase,-Aldebaran, prince of

Hyades,-Gemini, those gentle twins,-Capella, that seems a train of starry effulgence as she bounds across the firmament, like the Capella of the hills she shines upon. Thus did I wander and gaze, until my weary footsteps tended homewards, and I returned to my pillow, just as the last glimmer in the latest cottager's window was expiring.

CHAP. V.

Death at the Springs. Funerals. The Stranger-Dead. Leavetakings. Poetry to the Pope. Time at the Springs.

human sympathy, to do these last sad offices to one who had not died "among her kindred." There was a check awhile to all the gaiety and mirth of this gay and mirthful place, and the semblance, if not the reality of decent sorrow and quiet sadness, gave a striking illustration of the natural effect upon the mind of such lessons of the mutability of human affairs, as the funeral train pursued its slow and solemn way through the walks now deserted by the gay crowd, whose demeanor indicated that such an impression was produced as the scene seemed to demand. It was a moving illustration of the truth, that "in the midst of life we are in death."

The parting of friends, whose friendships have been formed but within a few weeks, and who, on bidding farewell to each other, have no other ties to sunder than

White Sulphur Springs, July 31, 1835. Death is everywhere, and the healing waters of this those that have had so short a time to twine around blessed Spring are not always efficacious. But two their hearts, would hardly seem, when abstractly condeaths have occurred here this season, and one was sidered, as likely to cause much mutual regret or to that of Dr. Stevenson of Boston; whose amiability and excellence of character, whose gentleness and produce a pang to feelings so slightly interested by association, habit, or sympathy. Yet there is, now and suavity of manners, whose professional and literary then, at places like this, (where we meet for the indulskill and genius, and whose general value as a citizen, are well known to Bostonians. He died here, in this gence of the best feeling of our nature, whence all interests that can clash with each other are, in the nalovely spot, whither he had come to avail himself of ture of things, completely shut out and unthought of, the use of the waters, being in a very low state of and where every one strives to enjoy the opportunity health-away from all save a few friends who surround- that may never again occur, to become interested in ed his pillow during his last days, and made up by those he meets, and to make himself acceptable to their assiduous attentions and delicate offices of kind-them,) a parting that approaches in poignancy the sepaness for the absence of those comforts which can only be enjoyed, at such a time, among one's kindred. He was much respected and lamented here, no less than at home.

rations of older friends, and the sundering of ties more strongly knit. It is honorable to our nature that this is

So.

At a place like this, there is a gathering of those whose habits and education are such as to render them

The other was that of a New York lady, who had likely to be mutually pleased with each other, and to left that city in delicate health, to travel to the western unite them together by such common bonds as are furcountry, where she had relatives. This journey was nished by the scene, the nature of the occasions that recommended to her by her physicians, as likely to call them hither, and the similarity of pursuits and restore her to health, and with her husband, she reach-identity of purposes that mark their life while here. ed this point in her tour, where, having business of pressing importance to attend to, he left her, not worse than she had been on her journey thus far, and returned to New York. He had, however, been there but a few days, when he heard, first of the extreme illness of

The little community becomes more and more consolidated in feeling, and its component parts become more and more necessary to each other's enjoyment—and thus, when there occurs a rupture in the chain of symhis wife, and on his way to meet her here, of her death. pathies so produced by the removal of a single link, it is sympathetically felt throughout all the rest, and the He took the stage-coach in which I came from Staun-loss is felt in proportion to the importance of the link ton, and we came on together. Heart-broken he arto the continuity and strength of the chain. rived at the Springs to perform the last sad offices to the remains of the partner of his life,-but too late. They had been faithfully discharged by strangers: and he had only the sad consolation to learn that all which could be done had been performed by the residents and visitants of the Springs, in the neighborhood where he had left her, and to visit her grave in the little burying ground connected with the place.

August 3.

Here is a copy of verses which have been "a nine days' wonder" at this place, and the curiosity as to the authorship of which has hardly yet subsided. They are addressed to a gentleman well known and highly appreciated in the annals of White Sulphur, the grand master of ceremonies for years on festive occasions, Such little incidents, at places so thronged with people and by prescription the Patroon of the establishment. from all parts of the country, strangers to each other, I may be breaking faith to send it to the press, but I and having no other sympathies with each others' feel-hope it will be excusable, as an attempt to preserve, ings than that which is the dictate of a common nature, in a durable form, one of the prettiest "bubbles of are always touching and impressive. It was a moving the Brunnens," which the season has produced. sight to behold that pall borne to the grave in a land so far from the home of the departed, by the hands of strangers, to see the remains of loveliness and worth followed to the tomb by those who had not known in life the form that had faded and was now mouldering to ashes, but who felt bound by the strong chain of

TO WILLIAM POPE, ESQ.

Oh the White Sulphur Spring! the White Sulphur Spring!
How pure, how limpid, how cool are its waters!
Every year, thither borne upon hope's buoyant wing,
Hie the brave and the fair and the rich from all quarters.
VOL. IV.-39