Hung on the pine his idle bow, His pirogue useless on the shore? 9. Sons of the brave! delay no more, LESSON LXXII. EXPLANATORY NOTE.-1. SARCOPHAGI is the plural of Sarcophagus, the Greek name of a stone coffin. The word literally means a flesh-devourer. It was so called by the ancients, because the species of stone, in which they deposited the dead which they did not choose to burn, caused the flesh, bones, and all except the teeth, to consume and waste away in a very short time. A VISIT TO MOUNT VERNON. H. GREELEY. WASHINGTON, Sept. 4, 1841.* 1. A STEAMBOAT passage of six miles to Alexandria, and a drive of nine miles farther in the same southern direction, over a wretched road, through a thin-soiled, wood-covered country, brought us, in a little less than three hours from this city, to MOUNT VERNON. The estate is completely isolated from all other cultivation; on the east, by the broad, magnificent Potomac, which sweeps partly around it in a south-easterly and then southerly direction; on the west and south-west, by a broken tract of half-grown forest, through which a brooklet. has worn a deep and wide gorge on its way to the river. 2. The cultivated portion of the estate, stretches mainly north and north-west from the mansion, a plain and modest white house of goodly size, which stands near the bank of the Potomac, fronting westerly upon the garden and grounds of the * A canoe formed out of the trunk of a tree. estate, around which half a dozen humbler dwellings, tenanted by families of black laborers and servants, are scattered with little regard to order or symmetry. The estate is now the possession and residence of Mrs. John A. Washington, widow of a nephew of Judge Bushrod Washington, himself the nephew of Gen. George Washington;-so swiftly do the generations of men follow each other in their solemn march to the tomb! 3. The original resting-place of the Father of his Country, and the old family sepulcher, is south of the mansion, immediately on the bank of the Potomac, though a steep and woody descent of over a hundred feet intervenes between it and the water. This sepulcher is a mere excavation in the earth, walled over in the rudest manner, and looking far more, at its entrance, like a hop-kiln or out-door cellar, than a place of rest for the illustrious departed. 4. But this cemetery is now deserted and of course dilapidated. A new and more fitting mausoleum of brick was constructed in 1837, south of the garden, and some two or three hundred yards south-west of the former, in which the remains of the Washington family are now deposited. It is built on ground sloping to the south, and the family cemetery is excavated in the hill-side, and is entered by an iron door; but in front of this, under the neat and appropriate brick structure itself, separated from the outer world only by a strong iron railing, rest side by side, in two marble sarcophagi,' the ashes of GEORGE and MARTHA WASHINGTON. 5. These marble inclosures are well executed, though simple, and I believe were presented by Mr. T. Struthers, a Philadelphia artist, as a token of affectionate reverence and admiration for the memory of the great departed. The inscription upon the top merely states the name, age, and time of the decease of each respectively; the death of Mrs. Washington having occurred in 1801, two years after that of her revered consort; and as her age is stated at 71 years, while he did not reach 68, she must have been nearly two years his senior. 6. After musing an hour by the sepulcher, we were conducted through the garden by a communicative black man, who rejoices in the appellation of Bill Smith, and who has been forty years on the estate, having come there with Bushrod Washington, soon after the decease of the Ex-President. The garden is rich in rare and valuable plants; among them are many planted by the hand of the Father of his Country. 7. Peaches, pears, lemons, oranges, are thickly surrounded by the aloe, myrtle, rose, geranium, &c., as well as by plants whose unfamiliar names escape me. The burning of an adjoining building, a few years since, destroyed some of them; but the garden is probably little changed since its world-renowned master stood in its midst, save in the greater profusion of its contents. Long may it continue to people the mind of the visitor with images of the past, and fitly blend its fragrance with the memory of WASHINGTON! 8. Slowly, pensively, we turned our faces from the rest of the mighty dead, to the turmoil of the restless living,—from the solemn, sublime repose of Mount Vernon, to the ceaseless intrigues, the petty strifes, the ant-hill bustle of the Federal City. Each has its own atmosphere; London and Mecca are not so unlike as they. The silent, enshrouding woods, the gleaming, majestic river, the bright, benignant sky,—it is fitly here, amid the scenes he loved and hallowed, that the man whose life and character have redeemed Patriotism and Liberty from the reproach which centuries of designing knavery and hollow profession had cast upon them, now calmly awaits the trump of the Archangel. 9. Who does not rejoice that the original design of removing his ashes to Washington, has never been consummated,— that they lie where the pilgrim may reverently approach them, unvexed by the light laugh of the time-killing worldling, unannoyed by the vain or vile scribblings of the thoughtless or the base? Thus may they repose forever!-that the heart of the Patriot may be invigorated,-the hopes of the Philanthropist strengthened, and his aims exalted, the pulse of the American quickened, and his aspirations purified by a VISIT TO MOUNT VERNON. 10. DISTURB not his slumber, let WASHINGTON sleep, Let him rest, calmly rest, on his dear native shore; LESSON LXXIII. NOTE. The following beautiful Epitaph was discovered on the back of a Portrait of WASHINGTON, Sent to the family from England. It was copied from a transcript in the hand-writing of JUDGE WASHINGTON. AN EPITAPH TO WASHINGTON. 1. THE defender of his Country, the founder of Liberty, The friend of man. History and tradition are explored in vain And the noblest names of Antiquity He made himself virtuous. 2. Called by his Country to the defense of her Liberties, He triumphantly vindicated the rights of humanity, And on the pillars of National Independence, Laid the foundation of a great REPUBLIC. Twice invested with Supreme Magistracy The glories of the field, And voluntarily resigning the scepter and the sword, A spectacle so new, and so sublime, Adding new luster to humanity, Glorious through life, Great in death; His highest ambition, the happiness of mankind,. His noblest victory the conquest of himself. Bequeathing to posterity the inheritance of his fame, And building his monument in the hearts of his Countrymen; He lived the ornament of the Eighteenth Century, He died regretted by a mourning world. LESSON LXXIV. WASHINGTON. ELIZA COOK. 1. LAND of the West! though passing brief the record of thine age, |