one of the numerous cascades which form so prominent and picturesque a feature in the scenery of the country. The peculiarities of this portion of America, and its effect upon the mind of Washington Irving, when a boy, are graphically described by him in the volume before us. Hudson. An old squaw spirit had charge of it, who "The Catskills form an advanced post, or lateral spur, of the great Alleganian or Appalachian system of mountains which sweeps through the interior of our continent, from South-west to North-east, from Alabama to the extremity of Maine, for nearly fourteen hundred miles, belting the whole of our original confederacy, and rivalling our great system of lakes in extent and grandeur. Its vast ramifications comprise a number of parallel chains and lateral groups; such as the Cumberland Mountains, the Blue Ridge, the Alleganies, the Delaware and Lehigh, the Highlands of the Hudson, the Green Mountains of Vermont, and the White Mountains of New Hampshire. In many of these vast ranges or sierras, nature still reigns in indomitable wildness; their rocky ridges, their rugged clefts and defiles, teem with magnificent vegetation. Here are locked up mighty forests that have never been invaded by the axe; deep umbrageous valleys where the virgin soil has never been outraged by the plough; bright s reams flowing in untasked idleness, unburthened by commerce, unchecked by the mill-dam. This mountain zone is in fact the great poetical region of our country; resisting, like the tribes which once inhabited it, the taming hand of cultivation, and maintaining a hallowed ground for fancy and the muses. It is a magnificent and all-pervading feature that might have given our country a name, and a poetical one, had not the all-controlling powers of common-place determined otherwise. "The Catskill Mountains, as I have observed, maintain all the internal wildness of the labyrinth of mountains with which they are connected. Their detached position, overlooking a wide lowland region, with the majestic Hudson rolling through it, has given them a distinct character, and rendered them at all times a rallying point for romance and fable. Much of the fanciful associations with which they have been clothed may be owing to their being peculiarly subject to those beautiful atmospherical effects which constitute one of the great charms of Hudson River scenery. To me they have ever been the fairy region of the Hudson. I speak, however, from early impressions, made in the happy days of boyhood, when all the world had a tinge of fairy land. I shall never forget my first view of these mountains. It was in the course of a voyage up the Hudson in the good old times before steamboats and railroads had driven all poetry and romance out of travel. A voyage up the Hudson in those days was equal to a voyage to Europe at present, and cost almost as much time: but we enjoyed the river then; we relished it as we did our wine, sip by sip, not, as at present, gulping all down at a draught without tastingumphed over tyranny, and religious faith fled before it. My whole voyage up the Hudson was full of wonder and romance. I was a lively boy, somewhat imaginative, of easy faith, and prone to relish everything which partook of the marvellous. Among the passengers on board of the sloop was a veteran Indian trader, on his way to the lakes to traffic with the natives. He had discovered my propensity, and amused himself throughout the voyage by telling me Indian legends and grotesque stories about every noted place on the river, such as Spuyten Devil Creek, the Tappan Sea, the Devil's Dans-Kammer, and other hobgoblin places. The Catskill Mountains especially called forth a host of fanciful traditions. We were all day slowly tiding along in sight of them, so that he had full time to weave his whimsical narratives. In these mountains he told me, according to Indian belief, was kept the great treasury of storm and sunshine for the region of the A picture by the President of the New York Academy of Arts places before us a noble specimen of these Catskill Mountains, and another, by T. A. Richards, delineates a noble group of the same range beside Coweta Creek, in North Carolina. We could linger over these scenes, for we love the mountains, and could write a homily about the "everlasting hills," up which the thoughts climb as if they would penetrate the clouds that settle on their summits. We would speak of Ararat, rearing its lofty head amid the waste of waters when the dove brought back the olive-branch to the ark; of Sinai, terrible with the thunders and lightning of Divine power; of Nebo, on whose summit Moses saw the "goodly land" he was forbidden to enter-and died; of Carmel, whose mys terious fire consumed the sacrifice of Elijah; of Lebanon, with its giant cedars; and of Olivet, that witnessed more than human agony; besides the long list of those made memorable by other facts than sacred history narrates, where patriotic heroism tri persecution. But instead of giving the reader our own ideas of the thoughts that rise within us in the contemplation of such material phenomena, we prefer extracting the description of a Transatlantic autumn, written with much elegance by an American lady, Miss Cooper, to elucidate one of the pictures we have just referred to. "There is always something of uncertainty, of caprice, if you will, connected with our American autumn, which fixes the attention anew, every suceeding year, and adds to the fanciful character of the season. The beauty of spring is of a more assured nature; the same tints rise year after year in her verdure and in her blossoms; but autumn is what our friends in France call 'une beauté journalière,' variable, changeable, not alike twice succession, gay and brilliant yesterday, more languid | used to hear it, on some calm Sabbath morning, and pale to-day. The hill-sides, the different groves, carried down the stream hard by the home of our the single trees, vary from year to year under the combined influences of clouds and sunshine, the soft haze, or boyhood, and gathering into the house of prayer rich the clear frost the maple or oak, which last October and poor, the uulettered and the man of understandwas glorious crimson, may choose this season to wear ing. The scene is one that might dictate an "elegy " the golden tint of the chestnut, or the pale yellow of to another Gray, so beautiful is it, so unostentatious, duller trees; the ash, which was straw-colour, may become dark purple. One never knows beforehand exactly so suggestive. The church in question is the "Church what to expect; there is always some variation, occa- of the Holy Innocents," situated, as before remarked, sionally a strange contrast. It is like awaiting the sun- on the west bank of the Hudson, about a mile south set of a brilliant day; we feel confident that the evening of the Military Academy at West Point; it is somesky will be beautiful; but what gorgeous clouds or what what more than a century old. There is an affecting pearly tints may appear to delight the eye, no one can foretell. incident related of the building of this edifice. "It was a soft hazy morning, early in October. The distant hills, with their rounded, dome-like heights, rising in every direction, had assumed on the surface of their crowning woods a rich tint of bronze, as though the swelling summits, gleaming in the sunlight, were wrought in fretted ornaments of that metal. Here and there a scarlet maple stood in full coloured beauty, amid surrounding groves of green. A group of young oaks close at hand had also felt the influence of the frosty autumnal dews; their foliage, generally, was a lively green, worthy of June, wholly unlike decay, and yet each tree was touched here and there with vivid snatches of the brightest red; the smaller twigs close to the trunk forming brilliant crimson tufts, like knots of ribbon. One might have fancied them a band of young knights, wearing their ladies' colours over their hearts. A pretty flowering dogwood close at hand, with delicate shaft and airy branches, flushed with its own peculiar tint of richest lake, was perchance the lady of the grove, the beauty whose colours were fluttering on the breasts of the knightly oaks on either side. The tiny seedling maples, with their delicate leaflets, were also in colour, in choice shades of scarlet, crimson, and pink, like a new race of flowers blooming about the roots of the autumnal forest. "We were sitting upon the trunk of a fallen pine, near a projecting cliff which overlooked the country for some fifteen miles or more; the lake, the rural town, and the farms in the valley beyond, lying at our feet like a beautiful map. A noisy flock of blue jays were chattering among the oaks whose branches overshadowed our seat, and a busy squirrel was dropping his winter store of chestnuts from another tree close at hand. A gentle breeze from the south came rustling through the coloured woods, and already there was an autumnal Sound in their murmurs. There is a difference in the music of the woods as the seasons change. In winter, when the waving limbs are bare, there is more of unity in the deep wail of the winds as they sweep through the forests; in summer, the rustling foliage gives some higher and more cheerful notes to the general harmony; and there is also a change of key from the softer murmurs of the fresh foliage of early summer to the sharp tones of the dry and withering leaves in October." But there is a gem of an engraving, after a picture by R. W. Weir, that instinctively brings us back to the "old country." That church with its low, square tower, its long sloping roofs, and its ivied walls, must have been transported to the west banks of the Hudson, from one of the southern counties of England: it stands upon rising ground that descends gently into a green, narrow valley studded with oaks, elms, and other stately trees, mingled with shrubs, and in which flocks of sheep are quietly grazing; at the back is a range of lofty bold hills, looking barren and bleak. We can fancy we are listening to the sound of the bells chiming along the valley, as we "While two or three persons at West Point were contemplating a plan for the erection of a church, somewhere near the spot on which the one in question now stands, for the benefit of the neighbouring population, and as a centre of missionary operations in the sur rounding country, embracing a large section of the Highlands, one of their number-Prof. R. W. Weirin the death of a child, made an offering of that child's moved by an afflictive dispensation of God's providence, portion to God, as the beginning of a fund for the building of a church, to be called The Church of the Holy He subsequently added to this sum other offerings of his own, and of a few other persons at West taking. The simple, but chaste and beautiful sanctuary, Point and elsewhere, who felt an interest in the undererected to the honour and glory of God,' is the fruit of these offerings." Innocents.' "The whole interior, marked by unity of design, by perfect simplicity, and by a quiet solemnity, cannot fail of every worshipper who enters there, in sincerity and to shed its hallowing, subduing influence over the soul truth, to worship God; while the exterior of the sacred temple, with its grey, unhewn walls, its very irregular outline, its simple rural aspect, harmonizes most strik midst of which it seems to have sprung up, itself a work ingly with the rough, wild mountain scenery in the of nature. And its tower, pointing heavenward, its cruciform outline, its cross-crowned peak, tell unmis. takeably its holy character, and serve to remind all who enter or behold it both of the end and of the faith to which God is calling them." with the artists and authors of the "Home Book of Our time precludes us from extending our tour the Picturesque," willing as we are to prolong such pleasant, variable, and instructive company: we would gladly sail with them up some of those noble rivers and broad lakes they have sketched and talked about, and to which we have scarcely made reference; and we should also like to tell something more of those wild legends and historical facts, associated with the places here portrayed; but we have space for neither. The traveller visits the East that he may linger over the scenes of sacred and classic history; he would see all that is left of Thebes and Nineveh, the sites of Babylon and Palmyra, the relics of Athenian grandeur, still beautiful in their decay, and of ancient Jerusalem, 66 trodden of the Gentiles." He traverses northern Europe, where the tower and castle carry him back to feudal times. He crosses the Alps and stands amid the broken tombs and dilapidated aqueducts of the Roman Campagna, or before the art-treasures of Naples and Florence: all these are the pride of nations that have gone or are passing away. But he crosses the Atlantic only to find himself in a new world-new in its physical appearance, new in its ideas and institutions, young and vigorous in energy and action. What its hereafter destiny may be, none can tell; that America will play no laggard's part in the future history of the world, it were unreasonable to doubt, when her broad valleys shall be filled with a numerous and intellectual peasantry, and the banks of her majestic rivers lined still more than now with thriving towns and cities. And although power and nobility of character are not always linked together, we may affirm, remembering from whose loins her people have sprung, and that the elements of true greatness have grown with her growth, that those gifts of intelligence and of natural advantages which have been lavishly bestowed upon her, will be used generously and wisely for the good of others. SHORT NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS. The Two Families. By the Author of Rose Douglas. 2 vols. Smith, Elder & Co. Cornhill. THE story of this simple, but powerful tale, is an illustration of the motto which is stamped upon the title-page—“Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it." The incidents flow, rather than arise, one from out the other; the origin of the hero of the first "family" is well conceived-working his way, stealthily and steadily, with a very, very little leaven, to leaven the selfishness and cunning which is part and parcel of himself, and yet cherishing one humanizing influence | in his heart. The author reads human nature keenly, and correctly, and with a kindly spirit; sorry for its flaws, its mistakes, its corruptions; while for the sake of that truth she (?) never violates, tracing them with unerring fidelity; but her heart expands, and her style improves, when she displays the workings, the strength, the truth, the purity, of the Christian struggling with adversity and sorrow, and triumphing in the end-as only Christians can triumph. ter of wealth and indulgence is as real as anything that we know of in the world of fiction; it is a fearful showing of a great truth, and mothers should take it to heart. We cannot close this too brief notice of "The Two Families" without directing attention to one other scene, of a very different nature-a vigil, kept among the heath-clad mountains of the Scottish highlands, by a wife beside the body of a beloved husband, who has been killed by the accidental discharge of his fowling-piece, and whom, guided by his dog, she has found, far-far away from any human habitation. The scene is depicted with the strength and tenderness of a master-hand, and is deeply pathetic without one extravagant word or overstrained sentence. Home and its Pleasures. Simple Stories for Young We hope in a little time to organize a system of HOME AND ITS PLEASURES Consists of simple stories for the young, the very young, by a very good friend to children-Mrs. Harriette Myrtle; the illus trations are printed in colours-and those who re member the illustrations to the books of our youth, will be more disposed to admire the taste and beauty which distinguished Mr. Cundell's "getting up" of the "picture books" he produced. Mr. Addey is following his example with spirit and success. We are disposed to play the censor with "children's books," for we know their importance, and their influence on the ductile minds of the young and we also know the advantage arising from correct forms, and forms of beauty, being placed before children. This pretty and pleasant book is quite a nursery treasure. The author's great forte lies in the delineation of character, and a power in scenic description we have rarely, if ever, known surpassed; there are many pages which are as fine highland landscapes as Cres- THE VILLAGE QUEEN, is a pastoral story by Tho wick or Landseer could place upon their canvas. We mas Miller, another established favourite, and one never unravel a plot in a review, (though, indeed, there whom it is pleasant to meet in the green lanes or is, properly speaking, no plot in this tale of contrast ;) green fields he loves so well. This volume is worthy it destroys the interest we hope our readers would a place in every drawing-room: for in addition to its feel in its perusal; but we regret, in this instance, simple unaffected tale, it is richly adorned by waterthat we have no room for extracts. The heroine of the coloured drawings by Edward Wehnert, John Absolon, second "family" is as pure from world-stain as the William Lee, and Harrison Weir. Mr. Milier relates hero of the first is marred by the desire for accumu- the criticism of a pretty gipsy girl who, upon being lating whatever gives influence or its semblance; and shown an engraving, said it was all wrong, because the development of the characters which dwell among "the trees were black instead of green." Certainly, those everlasting heath-clad hills, is truly artistic; sunshine is upon the illustrations of this brilliant but the volumes have the highest claim on the grati-volume-sunshine enough to satisfy the gypsy girl; tude of the mothers of the rising generation. The and the cattle by Harrison Weir are almost worth the lesson on the importance of "training a child in the price of the volume. way he should go" is most wisely and beautifully developed, and the death-bed of the pampered daugh CHILD'S PLAY, is another exquisite drawing-room book, of which we could say much, had we space. BLIND ROSA. BY HENRIK CONSCIENCE. (TRANSLATED BY MRS. HOWITT.) On a splendid summer day in 1846 the diligence was rolling along the great highway from Antwerp to Turnhout at the regular hour. The horses trotted, the wheels rattled, the carriage creaked, the driver clucked incessantly with his tongue in order to quicken the speed of his cattle, dogs barked in the distance, birds soared up from the fields high into the air, the shadow sped alongside of the diligence, and danced along with its peculiar motion amongst the trees and bushes. Suddenly the conductor pulled up not far from a solitary inn. He leaped down from his scat, opened the door of the diligence without saying a word, slapped down the step, and put out his hand to a traveller, who with a knapsack in his hand descended to the road. In the same silence the conductor again put up the step, closed the door, sprung again into his seat, and whistled gently to intimate to the horses that they must move. The horses trotted on; the heavy vehicle pursued its monotonous career. In the mean time the traveller had entered the inn, and seated himself at a table with a glass of ale before him. He was a man of more than ordinary size, and appeared to be about fifty. You might at the same time have supposed him to be sixty, if his vigorous carriage, his quick glance, and a certain youthful smile about his lips, had not testified that his soul and senses were much younger than his appearance. His hair was grey, his forehead and checks covered with wrinkles, and his complexion bore the stamp of early age which excessive exertion and long-continued care impress on the countenance. Yet, at the same time, his breast heaved with vigour, he bore his head upright, and his eyes still gleamed with the fire of manhood. By his dress you would take him for a wealthy citizen; it had nothing peculiar, except that the frock-coat buttoned to the throat, and the large meerschaum pipe which hung at his breast, bespoke a Flemish or a German officer. The people of the house, having attended to his demands, again returned to their occupations, without taking further notice of him. He saw the two daughters go to and fro, the father renew the fire with wood and turf, and the mother fill the kettle with water; but not one of them addressed to him a single word, though his eyes followed earnestly every member of the family, and although in his friendly glance might have been read the question-" Do you not recognise me ?" At this moment his attention was caught by the striking of a clock which hung upon the wall. As if the sound had painfully affected him, an expression of disagreeable surprise appeared in his countenance, and chased the smile from his lips. He stood up and contemplated the unlucky clock while it went sounding stroke after stroke, to the number of nine. The VOL. XV. mother observed the singular emotion of the stranger, and placed herself in wonder at his side; she too looked at the clock, as if to discover what he found so remarkable in it. "The clock has a pleasant sound-has it not?" said she. "It has now gone for twenty years without the hand of the clockmaker touching it." "And 66 Twenty years!" sighed the traveller. where, then, is the clock which hung there before? What has become of the image of the Virgin which stood here upon the mantelpiece. They are both probably broken and gone." The woman looked in astonishment at the stranger, and replied :-"The figure of the Virgin, Zanna broke as she played with it as a child. But it was really so pitiful, that the priest himself had advised us to buy another. Here stands the new one, and it is much handsomer." The traveller shook his head dissentingly. "And the clock," continued the hostess, "you will soon hear. The wretched old thing is always too late, and has hung from time immemorial in the lumber-room. There! now it is just beginning to buzz.” And in truth, there came from the adjoining room a peculiar, croaking noise. It was like the hoarse note of a bird which slowly wheezed out "Cuckoo! cuckoo!" But this extraordinary sound called into the traveller's countenance a beaming smile; accompanied by the hostess, he hastened into the lumberroom, and there with glistening eyes gazed on the old clock, which still had not got to the end of its "Cuckoo! cuckoo !" Both daughters approached the stranger with curiosity, and stared with wonder at him, their large eyes turning from him to their mother full of inquiry. The looks of the damsels awoke the stranger to consciousness, and he returned to the room, followed by the three women. His heart clearly felt very happy, for his features glowed with so attractive an expression of pleasure and good-will, and his eyes bedewed with tears glanced so brightly, that the two young girls with evident sympathy approached him. He seized their hands and said : : "You think my conduct strange, eh, children? You cannot conceive why the voice of the old cuckoo delights me so much. Ah! I too have been a child, and at that time, my father, when he had done his work, used to come and drink here his glass of ale. When I had behaved well, I was allowed to accompany him. For whole hours have I stood and waited for the cuckoo opening its little door; I have danced and leaped to the measure of her song, and admired in my childish simplicity the poor bird as a masterpiece. And the sacred image of the Virgin, which one of you has broken, I loved it for its beautiful blue mantle, and because the little Jesus-child stretched its arms towards me, and smiled as I smiled. Now is the child-myself-almost sixty years old, with grey hair and furrowed countenance. and-thirty years have I passed in the steppes of Russia, and yet I remember the sacred image of S Four Mary, and the cuckoo, as if I had only been brought | who was envied by the young men because the girls hither by my father yesterday." "You are from our village, then?" said Zanna. "Yes, certainly," answered the stranger with a joyous precipitance. But this announcement had not the anticipated effect; the girls only smiled familiarly; that was all; the intelligence seemed to give them neither pleasure nor pain. The traveller turned to the mother: "Well," said he, "what is become of Baes Joostens ?" showed him the preference? I am he, Jan Slaets of the hill." "Very possibly," said the host, incredulously; "at the same time, do not take it amiss, my good Sir, if I do not remember you. Our village has no longer a bird-shooting; the shooting-ground is converted into private property, and for a year past has been unoccupied, owing to the death of the possessor." Deterred by the cold reception of the host, the traveller gave up the attempt to make himself "You mean Baas Jan," answered the hostess; known; but as he prepared to go further, he said "he died about twenty years ago." "And his wife, the good stout Petronella ?" "Dead too," was the answer. "Dead! dead!" sighed the stranger; "and the young herdsman, Andries, who made such handsome baskets ?" "Also dead," replied the hostess. The traveller dropped his head and gave himself up to gloomy thoughts. In the mean time the hostess went out into the barn to relate to her husband what had passed with the unknown guest. The host entered the room carelessly, and awoke by his noisy wooden shoes the stranger out of his reverie. He sprung up, and with an exclamation of delight, rushed with outstretched arms towards the host, who coldly took his hand, and almost with indifference looked at him. "Don't you either know me again, Peter Joostens?" cried the stranger, quite confounded. "No, I do not recollect ever to have seen you," replied the host. "No! Don't you know who it was that ventured his life under the ice to rescue you from an otherwise inevitable death?" The host shrugged his shoulders. Deeply wounded, the traveller continued, almost moved to tears :"Have you actually forgotten the youth who defended you against your bigger comrades, and supplied you with so many birds'-eggs, that you might make a beautiful garland for the may-pole? He who taught you to make so many pipes of reeds, and who so often took you with him when he went with the tile-burner's cart to market?" "Something of the kind floats dimly in my memory," answered the host; "my late father used to tell me that when I was about six years old I was very near perishing under the ice; but that tall Jan drew me out, and that he went away with the rest in the emperor's time to serve for cannon fodder. Who knows now where his bones lie in unconsecrated earth? God be merciful to his poor soul!" "Ah! now at length you know me!" exclaimed the stranger joyously; "I am tall Jan, or rather, Jan Slaets." As he did not receive an immediate answer, he added in surprise : -- "You recollect the good shot at the bird-shooting, who for four miles round was reckoned the best sportsman, who every time carried off the prize, and calmly : : "In the village here there live a good many of my friends who cannot have forgotten me. You, Peter Joostens, were very young at that time. I am persuaded that the brick-maker, Paul, will rush to my arms the moment that he sees me. Does he yet live in the clay dale ?" "The brick-yard became, many years ago, a prey to the flames; the clay-field is cultivated, and hears now the finest hay. The meadow now belongs to the rich Mr. Tirt." "And what has become of Paul ?" "After their misfortunes, the whole family went away. I do not know certainly, perhaps he too is dead. But I observe that you talk of our grandfathers' time, and it will be difficult to get answers to all your questions unless you go to the grave-digger. He can reckon up for you on his fingers what has happened for a hundred years past, or more." "I can believe that; Peter Jan must have reached his ninetieth year." "Peter Jan? That is not the name of the gravedigger; his name is Lauw Stevens." A glad smile illumined the countenance of the traveller. "God be praised," he exclaimed, "that he has at least left one of my comrades still in life!" "Indeed! was Lauw your friend, Sir?" "Not exactly my friend," replied the traveller, shaking his head: "we were always at loggerheads. Once, in the heat of our strife, I flung him from the little bridge into the brook, so that he ran great risk of drowning; but above thirty years are flown since then. Lauw will be glad to see me again. Give me now your hand, good Joostens; I shall often come to drink a glass of ale with you here." He paid, took his knapsack under his arm and went out. Behind the inn he took his way through s young pine-wood. His interview with the host, although not very animating, had, nevertheless infused comfort into the heart of the traveller. Memories from his childhood transported him; memories at every step crowded upon him, and gave him new life. True, the young wood could say nothing to him; in its place stood formerly a tall pine-wood, whose trees had concealed so many birds'-nests, under whose shade the refreshing bilberries had ripened. It had fared with the wood as with the inhabitants of the village,— the old trees had fallen, or were cut down, and a new |