PUBLISHED MONTHLY, AT FIVE DOLLARS PER ANNUM-THOMAS W. WHITE, EDITOR AND PROPRIETOR. VOL. IX. RICHMOND, JANUARY, 1843. EXTRACT FROM AN UNPUBLISHED POEM. BY E. B. HALE. I. 'Twas an Autumn's eve--with the sick man's groan, II. And the yellow leaves, all sere and dry, In a funeral march, went rustling by, III. And thro' the bows of the willow tree That stood by the good man's door, As they ne'er had sung before. But all was calm and as still within, As the hour of peaceful rest: And the dying man, in his thoughts had been, ΝΟ. 1. upon the faith of this list, and on the promise of these subscribers that many of our engagements were made-they are pressing upon us-this is the time for us to meet them-and these arrearages are our main reliance. They are divided among many hundreds of subscribers, and the sum owed by each is trifling in itself to him, but, in the aggregate, the amount is large, and by us is greatly needed. It is our sole reliance-a mere pittance to the subscriber, but a fortune to the publisher. Many, we know have withheld their fees, on account of the deranged state of the currency. Their motives were good, and are highly appreciated. But we can better lose a part now than we can afford to wait longer. Our distant subscribers who have been thus actuated, are respectfully informed that the currant bank notes of every State, are now received by us at their par value. Any one, may forward his subscription fee, free of postage, through the post-master, who is empowered to frank all such communications. We cannot close this appeal, without returning our thanks to our numerous contributors for their many favors. Notwithstanding the tightness of the times, there is a noble band of those who have stood by us manfully, and have proudly borne us along the walks of literature. EDITOR'S ADDRESS. THE NAVY AND THE WEST. We respectfully and earnestly invite the attention of The ending of the old and the beginning of the new-year, are land-marks in the ways of business;the former is the time for casting back and settling up old scores the latter, for looking blithely ahead, and forming new plans. We have taken a view each way, and are reminded, that, to day, we turn over a new leaf in a new volume of the Messenger. While we are doing this, we beg the attenThis is a neatly printed pamphlet of twenty odd tion of our friends and subscribers for a few mo- pages, the object of which is fully set forth in the ments. Times are hard-our engagements are title page. Our readers, doubtlessly, will recollect pressing; we have wrought the year through, and the letters of Harry Bluff, which, under the alias furnished our subscribers with every jot and tittle of "Union Jack," were addressed in the Messenof what we promised to give them. Have they done the same by us? Many, we are happy to say, have and many, the state of our finances reminds us, have not. To the first, we return many and hearty thanks to the last, we appeal for justice. Our subscription list is a large one; had we half of what is due by it, we should be satisfied for years to come. A few names on this list are marked paid for 1843, some for 1842, but the rest are in arrears, some for one year, some for two years, some for three and some ever since the Messenger began. If one moiety of these arrearages were paid up, we should ask no favors and give no duns. It was VOL. IX-1 ger, to Mr. Clay, about eighteen months ago, setting forth the claims of the South and West upon the Navy. These letters were nobly responded to by the press in those regions. In answer to Harry Bluff's appeal to Western patriotism, Tennessee has manfully stepped forth, and bravely responded. Memphis in particular, has asserted her claims, and * Proceedings of the Board of Mayor and Aldermen of the City of Memphis, Tennessee, on the subject of the Establishment of a Western Armory and Naval Depot and DockYard at Memphis: together with the report of Col. D. Morrison, Civil Engineer, the Report of the Committee appointed by the Board, &c. &c. Printed at the "Appeal" Office, Memphis, Tennessee, 1812. Mexico, are only those of the Mississippi, extended. These defences operating more immediately for the protection of the South and West, in whose hands should they be placed, but in those of Southern and Western yeomen? Is the West willing, in case of war, to entrust the defences of the Gulf to Eastern sailors? the Western boys are its natural defenders. Those defences must consist of steamers-the West is the land of steamboats, and Western river boatmen would furnish our man-of-war steamers with the best crews in the world. The steamers intended for the gulf should be built in the Westequipped in the West, and manned in the West. There their crews should be shipped, and there they should be paid off and discharged. The boilers and engines, instead of being made and so too with the cannon for these boats. Are gentlemen aware, that the best and cheapest guns, that have been procured for the Navy, are cast on the Western waters from Western iron? These cannon have been delivered at ninety odd dollars, whereas Eastern founders received under former contracts-from $135 to $140, for like pieces. preferred them with such force of reason and argu- lise-the Gulf of Florida is the outlet for Western ment that has fairly brought them to the favorable no-commerce-therefore the defences of the Gulf of tice of Congress. Though the shores of the West, be not washed by the tides of the Ocean, they are by noble streams that load the Ocean with commerce; and anything that is "tarry and briny" closely concerns many of their best interests. Let us see therefore, what connexion the South and West have, or ought to have, with the Navy There is a steam man-of-war; let's look at her, and examine whence came the materials of that smoky leviathan. Her bulwarks, her sides, her timbers and her ribs, are of oak and pine. Where did they grow, and whence were they taken? They grew in the South and West, and were taken to the East, to be moulded into shape. Her machinery is made from Western iron, by Eastern mechanics. Her cordage and her canvass were produced in the West; but the profits of their manu-on the banks of the Hudson, should be manufacfacture filled Eastern pockets. The copper and the tured on the banks of the Mississippi-and the lead used in her construction, though smelted on the hemp too of Kentucky, instead of being sent round waters of the Upper Mississippi, were carried away to the rope yard at Boston to be spun into cordage, in Eastern ships, bought by the government of Eas- should be stopped at the Memphis boat-yard, and tern merchants, manufactured in Eastern work-be manufactured there-so too with chain cables— shops; and for why? that Eastern states might monopolize Navy disbursements. And though she be intended for the Gulf of Mexico, and therefore, more immediately for the protection of Southern and Western interest, her crew are Eastern men, shipped and paid off in Eastern ports, and fed on Western pork and beef, taxed with Eastern profits: the very fuel that gives her power, though it may be had on the banks of the Western rivers for five cents the bushel, is bought in Eastern towns of Eastern men, at a good round Eastern price, and then transported in Eastern ships, by Eastern crews, and Eastern masters, for Eastern owners, and deposited at the door-way of the West, at more than double cost. The coal, that is supplied to our steamers at Pensacola is supplied from Boston-which is supplied from an English province, and costs the government, we are informed, by the time it is landed at Pensacola, from $15 to $20, per ton-whereas better coal-coal that burns freely--that will neither "clink" nor "choke," may be furnished from our Western river banks, and landed at Pensacola, or any where in the Gulf, at less than half that price. Verily, Southern and Western legislators are strangely blinded to their interests in relation to the Navy. Why should not all this timber, and all this iron, and all this hemp, and all this copper, this lead, this coal, this beef and this pork; aye, There is another subject too, besides the estaband this crew, be supplied directly from the West?lishment of a National Boat-Yard on the MissisWith the Memphis Aldermen, we think they should, sippi, which would redound greatly to the advanand we hope to see the attention of Western mem-tage of the West--and which we have time now bers in Congress, turned, in good earnest, to this only to glance at. We allude to a survey, or rather subject, for the general, not less than the sectional an "index" of the Western rivers, by which their interests, require that the links in the chain which navigation may be improved, and rendered more cerbinds the West to the Navy, should be made bright. tain, as well as more safe. The public coffers have The mouth of the Mississippi is not at the Ba- been, for years, opened with a liberal hand for what When a vessel is crippled in the gulf, it certainly would be nearer, and safer, and cheaper, to send her to the Boat-yard at Memphis for repairs, than it would be to send her to New-York or Boston. View this subject as we may, reason, justice, and public weal, all point to the banks of the Mississippi, as the proper site for the National Boat-yard, and to the Western rivers as the best nursery for armed boatmen. We should be much pleased to hear that Lieut. Hunter, in his newly constructed steamer, the Union, had been sent by the Department up the Mississippi, that the Western people may see a steam vessel-of-war, and be reminded of the intercsts they have at stake in this matter; they would recognize in her, the produce of their hills and their valleys, which had been carried away in the rough, wrought up into shape, and sent back again to their doors;-then, perhaps, their eyes would be fully opened to our course of reasoning. 66 all the other figures, till 9 was represented by a speak but once, he could tell by the sound of his large pin in the central hole, and a small one in the own voice, whether the place of any of the furniNorth-Western hole of the little square. The same ture of his rooms had been changed during his abapparatus was also used by Saunderson for Geome-sence. He replied to Diderot, who asked him whetry; he could produce any straightlined figure upon ther he did not often wish he were able to see; it by putting the pins so as to represent the angles Yes, but only because curiosity plagues me, of the figures which he wanted to delineate, and otherwise I would prefer very long arms; I could then wrapping them with a silk thread. The ce- then become acquainted with objects at a distance, lerity with which Saunderson performed the longest better than you can with your telescopes; besides, calculations by means of this simple contrivance, the eyes are much more easily lost than the fingers." is said to have been truly wonderful; he calculated with it, and then prepared permanently tangible tables of the natural sines, tangents, etc., which can yet be seen at Cambridge. His biography, written by his disciple and friend, Juchlif, was published in Dublin in 1747. John Kaeferle, son of a miller, was born in 1768, at Weiblingen in Germany. He lost the sight of one eye in early infancy, and that of the other when about four years old, by the accidental discharge of a crossbow. His talents for music and mechanics, for which he afterwards became celebrated, showed Dr. Henry Mayes, born in Manchester, lost his themselves at an early age. When only five years sight in early infancy. He was carefully instructed old, in a few weeks, and without assistance, he by his parents, in languages, music, mathematics learnt to play several tunes on a little toy violin and chemistry; he evinced during his youth, a de- which had been given to him as a new-year's gift. cided taste for mechanics, and succeeded in making At the early age of ten years, his fathers' turningwind-mills, looms, etc. As professor of Chemistry lathe having attracted his attention, he secretly exin Pitterweem, Scotland, he lectured with much amined into its mechanism, and without any body's applause on the various branches connected with assistance, turned a set of ten pins. Soon after, his chair. He not only repeated the experiments he made a neat and exact model of the machinery by which the identity of Galvanism and Electri- contained in a neighboring wool-factory. A year eity, used to be demonstrated, but invented several afterwards, he made for his father, a useful ciderstriking new ones. He first found out that copper, zink and wet paper, were not the only materials out of which a galvanic pile can be constructed. He also first noticed the presence of gas in water through which a galvanic stream has passed. He founded upon his experiments, a very ingenious theory by which he accounted for the difference in the quantity of vapor sustained in the air at different times. He was a pleasant companion, and as a lecturer, remarkable for the clearness and conciseness of his language. (Bacyka p. 51.) press. About this time, his father having bought a mile in the neighborhood of Lewisburg, John erected for a blacksmith of the town, a pair of bellows worked by water power. He invented different kinds of traps for mice, rats, minks, birds, etc. In his fifteenth year this blind youth undertook to furnish the farm of his father with water, and succeeded in this undertaking by building in the river Necker, a forcing pump, which adapted itself to the height of the water, and was worked by the force of its current. At the age of sixteen, one eye Joseph Kleinhars, born at Nauders, in Tyrol, be- was operated upon by a surgeon, who succeeded came blind in his fourth year. He made crucifixes in restoring its sight for a short time; but, four and holy figures of wood, in which all parts were months afterwards, a violent inflammation not only in due proportion, and which expressed affliction, destroyed the eye-bail, and thus blasted all hopes of delight, and other affections of the mind. He made his ever seeing again, but also affected his general statues from less than a foot high, to the common health materially, and confined him for a long time size of the human body, which would do honor to to his bed. At the age of twenty, being perfectly many seeing artists. He also carved, in great per- recovered, he began to make musical instruments, fection, heads or busts of living persons, which he an occupation which he followed ever after with took off by feeling, either from nature or from casts. great success and distinction. The instruments The blind man of Puisseaux, whose manifold ac- which he made first-violins and guitars—were so quirements Diderot (letters sur les aveugles) de- well made that they met with ready sale at a good scribes, was the son of a professor of Philosophy price. But, having accidentally obtained a piano, in the high school of Paris where he attended the he soon showed a decided predilection for that instrudifferent schools and received his education. Hav-ment, and learned in a few months to play on it so ing become reduced in circumstances he repaired well, that he was appointed organist in a neighborto Puiseaux, where he erected a distillery. He was ing church. His father bought him a small organ, singular in many of his actions; it was his custom, the bellows of which were intended to be worked for example, to sleep during the day and to work by the feet of the player; but finding this irksome, all night, because, as he said, he was not apt to be he soon contrived to attach them to the machinery interrupted. His memory of sound was so good, of his fathers' mill, and to have them blown by its that he could recognise persons whom he had heard 'means. He constructed his first piano in 1790. This first attempt was not as successful as he had an- visible creation, he proves to us, that had Homer ticipated; a result which, if we take into considera- and Milton been born blind, instead of losing their sight in after life, they might still have reared those splendid monuments of mental power, the immortal Iliad and Paradise Lost. tion the exactness with which such an instrument must be built, the intricacy and the number of its component parts, we shall not wonder at. This want of success, however, did not discourage him; Maria Theresia van Paradies, born at Vienna in he soon tried again, and this time succeeded be- the year 1759, was the daughter of an Imperial yond his own expectations. The mill of his father Councellor. She became blind when about two having, about this time been consumed by fire, John years old, and so gradual was her loss of sight that was obliged to relinquish his favorite occupation, for some time her parents could not persuade themto assist him in repairing the loss. He turned selves that she had actually ceased to see. As nearly all the wheels, constructed the greatest part soon however as they ascertained that the loss was of the machinery of the new mill, and presented irretrievable, they employed all the means in their his father with a new set of furniture of his own power to cultivate her mind and to give to her unmaking. After the death of his father, which hap- common activity, the direction which would most pened shortly afterwards, young Kaeferle, who al- likely conduce to her happiness. Nature having ready enjoyed considerable reputation, established endowed her with uncommon talents for music, they a piano manufactory in Lewisburg, hired a large wisely determined to cultivate them; and, such was number of journeymen, and gradually improved his the rapidity of her progress, that whilst yet a child, instruments so that he became one of the most dis- she acted as organist in one of the churches of Vitinguished instrument makers in Germany. He then enna before the Empress Maria Theresia, who was married, had a house built according to a plan of so much pleased with her performance that she his own, and extended his business to foreign coun- granted her a pension for the remainder of her life. tries. The invention of Harmonicas having obliged The best music teachers in Vienna were engaged him to make himself acquainted with the art of to cultivate her taste in playing, singing and comcasting and working metals, he soon made himself posing. Music was with her, the language of the master of the subject, and invented many ingenious heart. She chose as subjects of her composition contrivances to facilitate his operations. He was the passions of mankind, and her lively imaginaalso well acquainted with chemical manipulations, tion entitled her to portray them with great vividprepared himself all the paints and varnish used in ness and truth. Accompanied by her mother, she his manufactory, made potatoe-sugar, etc. This made in 1784, a journey through Germany, Switremarkable man lives still (1819,) resides in Louis-zerland, France, and England. She played in Paburg, in the midst of his family, is wealthy and ris before the Queen, took part in the "concert spigenerally respected, furnishing us with a striking proof that industry and talents can supply the place of the most important senses. (Klein p. 251.) ritual," and was received every where with unbounded applause. The same honors awaited her in London where she became acquainted with many This is an extraordinary case, but it is well at- of the most distinguished persons of Great Britain. tested; indeed, we have ourselves seen so many It was not only the extraordinary talents for music extraordinary instances of the great powers of the of Miss Paradies that excited the astonishment of blind, that we have no doubt of those of Kaeferle. all those who became acquainted with her, but her We have known young men who roamed all over amiable disposition, the activity of her mind, the the country, alone, by the help of a cane and a ease and the modesty of her manners and her manipocket compass; who rode fearlessly about on horse-fold scientific acquirements. The apparatus which back, and who would mingle with ease in society, she invented to overcome the obstacles which want and take their part in many of its amusements such of sight threw in her way, was very ingenious. as dancing, chess, etc. Indeed, we often meet blind She corresponded with her friends by means of a persons who have been properly neglected, if we little printing press. She invented a method for may so express ourselves-for neglect is better for writing out her own musical compositions, by pricka blind child than the excessive attention which ing the notes with a pin upon thick paper or pastethey generally receive, and which prevents the de- board. This process was afterwards much simplivelopment of their faculties. Such persons are fied by Mr. Kempillen, the inventor of the automato be found almost every where going about the ton chess player, who made a press with which she streets, and from town to town alone. printed music in relief. She performed obstruce calculations by means of the cyphering board which Saunderson had invented. On her maps, the boundaries and rivers were marked and rendered tangible by fine wire or silk threads; the sea by sand, and the towns by flat pearls. She danced well. Her exquisite sensibility of hearing, and her long attention to the intonation of the voice, enabled A distinguished man of letters who has flourished within a few years, was the Rev. Dr. Blacklock, of Scotland, who was born blind; and yet became a most chaste and ripe scholar, an able divine, and a beautiful poet. He published a volume of poems which bear all the marks of genius, and in which by an extraordinary power of description of the The education and the acquirements of Miss Paradies, coupled with the absence of one of the most important senses, drew the attention of the public to the means by which this education had been acquired. Harvy became her friend, and this philanthropist was undoubtedly indebted to her for many valuable suggestions in relation to plans for the instruction of the blind. her to judge of character with great accuracy and kept in the same establishment, and thus transmitted precision. She recognized persons with whom them from age to age, with the greatest fidelity. she had not conversed for many years, by the It must have been a singular sight, to visit this livoice. She moved with ease and freedom, and 'brary of walking books, and to have consulted these never ran against any large object. Her ideas of talking archives. Instead of pulling down a musty beauty coincided with regular proportions; she ap-folio, to seek for an historical fact, you would walk peared, however, to lay but little stress upon it, and up to a blind man, and ask if he were the deposiridiculed, often, the idea of attaching value to some-tory of the records of such and such a century; thing about which so few persons agree. and he would answer, yes! or else, that his neighbor, further on, was the right volume; and then you might ask him a thousand questions, and, turning over the tablets of his memory, as the leaves of a book, learn at the same time the matter in question, and the opinion of the recorder besides. The oldest institution for the blind in Europe, is the celebrated quinge-vingts, or hospital of 300 blind, established by St. Louis at Paris, in 1260. This Peter Pontanus, or Dupont, called the blind man institution, however, is an asylum, and not a school, of Bauges, flourished at the commencement of the and I am sorry to add, that although well managed sixteenth century. He lost his sight in his third in many things, it is in a moral point of view by year; but this misfortune, though it perhaps im- no means a pattern for a blind asylum. It was peded, could not prevent his making splendid at- founded at a time when it was not known that the tainments in science and literature. Such is the blind are capable of receiving instruction, and when luxuries of genius, that nothing seems capable to it was thought that benevolence could not do more repress its growth,-it shoots without culture-it than to provide for the wants of their animal nabuds and blossoms amid misfortune and poverty, ture. Mr. Signier, the able Director of the instiand bids defiance to the impediments of circum- tution for the instruction of the blind in that city stances. He taught belles lettres at Paris with is not satisfied with the quinge-vingts, even as a unexampled success, and published many works, residence for his pupils, after they leave the school. which augmented his reputation and celebrity. He has been endeavoring to have another asylum Among other productions, one on rhetoric, and a erected on purpose for them, and assigns as the treatise on the art of making poetry, in which he reason, that the blind at the quinge-vingts, havattacks Despaultere, are the most esteemed. Pon- ing never been in the habit of working, and being tanus was a profound philosopher, enlightened and supported there in idleness, soon communicate to religious; an enemy to duplicity, and the friend of those who come from his school, their own imtruth. moral and idle habits. Va. Institute for the Blind, THE DECLINE OF POETRY. BY PAYNE KENYON KILBOURN. We see from all these examples and countless others, which might be adduced, that long before Institutions were established, it must have been known that some blind persons, by the use and improvement of the senses of hearing and feeling, had risen to the highest degree of mechanical and mental attainments. These remarkable instances, however, instead of convincing the public that there "The poetic era is with the past," wrote the fais nothing in blindness to incapacitate a person af- mous Christopher North, more than a quarter flicted with it, from acquiring that knowledge which of a century ago; and it needs not the ken of a will make him both useful and happy, were, up to magician to divine that the spirit of the present age the times of the immortal Harvy, considered as de- bears with it no indication of a speedy return of partures from the common course of things, and no the "good old times," when Dante, and Homer, systematic attempts were made to rescue this un- and Sapho, enchanted the world with the melody fortunate class of our fellow-beings from ignorance of their numbers, and shed the lustre of their geand consequent wretchedness. Indeed, more was nius and the glory of their renown upon the eras done for them out of civilized Europe, and among and countries in which they lived. And if it be the Pagans than within it. We have already al- indeed true, that the pure and elevated sentiments Juded to the fact, that in Japan many blind persons which form the principal elements of the poetic were kept, at the expense of the government, as a spirit, are on the decline-if the prevailing opisort of living library; for, instead of having the nions which characterise our age and nation are history of the country written in books, the events not tending to elevate us in the scale of intelligent, were related to blind men, who committed them to thinking, rational beings-then it is incumbent upon memory, and repeated them to young blind men, 'all who rejoice in the well-being of their race, to VOL. IX-2 |