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Who hath observed them well, and dare rebuke
The unhelped learning of the olden time,
Which made them ministers of man's destiny?

Tell me, thou wanderer of the " upper deep," Thou, who canst only live where Nature wears Her robe of pleasant green begemmed with flowers, Tell me, if ever in thy rambling flight

O'er mount and river, from the orange groves Of Florida, to where the covenant bow, Fore'er its threads of ravelled light displaying, Assures the soul that shudders at the roar Of wild Niagara foaming down his steepTell me, if ever thou hast "poured thy throat" Where moves her form as graceful as thine own, And o'er the flowers as lightly glides her step, Who heard my vows and turned her not away. I cannot think that with the power to wing Thy form at will in search of happiness, Thou hast not sought it where her presence bears An atmosphere as bright and beautiful As in the glory of a morn like this Awakes the harmonies of grove and field. Say, dost thou come her spirit's messenger, From the far region which she gladdens now, To bid my soul live o'er past happiness? I feel thou dost; for, buoyant as thine own, My heart is glowing with strange ecstasy. Again the form I love is in my arms, Again I clasp her to this longing breast, Again I call the name which makes us one, And press the lips which discord never passed. I know thou dost; for, as I speak, thy tone Is changed for one so chastely passionate; So joyous with an untold happiness, Yet something sad, as is the voice that tells How from the meshes of anxieties Deliverance hath been wrought triumphantly; So like the kindling tones of love's own voice; So like the voice my soul hath learned to love, That it shall revel in thy melody: Nor shall a thought be born, to intercept The tide of joy now flowing to my heart.

A change again! Thou faithless messenger!
Thy tone is now more sad than hers was wont:
Yet doth it sound familiar.. 'Tis the same
In which so oft she said her fond farewell.
Oh sing it still! for saddest memories
Are comforters, if with her image joined ;
Sing on! sing on! nor wing thy rapid flight
Again to her whose envoy meet thou art,
Till I have told thee how the anxious days,
The watchful nights, bear witness to the truth
And constaney

But thou, alas! hast gone:
And as the abandoned mariner, who sees
From rugged eminence of desert isle,
In ocean's wave the tallest topmast sink,
Still gazes on the trackless element

Which bears away his newly kindled hope;
So in my desolation do I gaze

Upon the void that parts thee from my sight.

Oh! thou Omnipotent! without whose ken, Not even the meanest of the feathered race Falls to the ground, be to my chosen one, The pure in heart and blameless in intent, If pure and blameless be upon the earthBe to her, Father! still a guide and guard; Restore her to the home she loves so well; And bid a blessing settle where she dwells.

NOTES AND ANECDOTES,

Political and Miscellaneous-from 1798 to 1830.-Drawn from the Portfolio of an Officer of the Empire,-and translated from the French for the Messenger, by a gentleman in Paris.

THE CONSPIRACY OF AUGUST, 1820.

I might take, at hazard, any one of the various conspiracies which were suppressed under the restoration, and I should find new evidence in support of what I have stated, that the French are, of all people, the least fit for a conspiracy. I am convinced, could the revolution of July have been brought about only by a conspiracy, that we should still be under the yoke of Charles X. There are peculiarities in the character of nations, as in that of individuals. The French people, the most warlike, perhaps, in the world, and the best adapted by nature to sustain the hardships and deprivations of war, are entirely destitute of that sort of firmness essential to the success of a conspiracy. They have none of that cold, calculating self-denial, necessary to the execution of a grand design. Precipitate a Frenchman upon some palpable danger, and you will find him admirable. Tell him to await its arrival, and it will be different. The French have more bravery than courage, and in a conspiracy, courage is more necessary than mere bravery.

There are no synonymes in the French language, though a dictionary of synonymes has been made. One may be brave without being courageous, as one may be courageous without being brave, or may be both at the same time. Bravery is a physical quality, courage is a moral virtue. Bravery is the result of a good constitution, of warm blood circulating freely; a man whose lungs beat freely under a large breast, ought to be a brave man. A man in the last stage of consumption may be extremely courageous, because courage has nothing in common with the physical form; because it is the result of a sentiment of honor, of the consciousness of duty. It is unnecessary for me to say that I speak generally. I am ready to admit that there are many exceptions, and no country has ever exhibited more glorious ones than our own. But it is a fact, proved beyond dispute, that while we are superior in the attack, we are worthless for defence; and it is precisely the sort of courage necessary for defensive war, that is required in a conspiracy.

It must also be confessed that we Frenchmen have, in general, something of the braggart, and are terrible babblers; these are virtues of the least possible value in a conspiracy. Thus it is that no conspiracy is possible in France, unless, indeed, as on the 10th Brumaire, all the world be in the secret; then, one may boast and babble at his ease-nobody is to be feared.

whose services to foreign powers during the emigration, had been thus liberally paid. They required a particle, a de, before the name even of a sub-lieutenant, and the title of a half-pay officer curled their lips with the most disdainful ill-humor. If these chiefs gave any dinners or soirées, the officers who had been taken from the half-pay class were excluded. From the

Notwithstanding the address voted in 1822, by the chamber of deputies, as a reply to the assertion of Manuel, it is not the less true that the Bourbons were received with repugnance by the majority of France; that, however, did not prevent a few acclamations on their passage to Paris. If such acclamations are to be reckoned of any importance, our affections must be very changeable. Nor will I deny that after the hun-chiefs, these sentiments were communicated to the offidred days, bands of women of all conditions danced under the windows of the Tuileries, singing a spirituelle rondo, the first verse of which concealed under a sort of pun, a delicate allusion to the last journey of the king:

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The Bourbons had to struggle against their name, and the origin of their newly acquired power. I do

not believe them either better or worse than others.

cers most in favor. They did not openly show disrespect to the newly chosen officers, who would not have submitted to such treatment, but they isolated them completely; they formed them into a separate band. The latter bringing with them their claims of seniority, thus destroyed the hopes of the young officers of 1815, who saw in them the usurpers of their rights. Had they been animated by the best intentions in the world, they must thus have been made the enemies of the

government.

There were certainly exceptions to all that I have just stated; I could cite the names of individuals, were it not that such a course would reflect upon those not

Forced to support themselves in a minority, they sub-mentioned. Twelve or fifteen regiments at the most

mitted to its laws, and committed all the faults that this minority could impose upon them; faults forced upon the minority by the necessity of self-preservation. The government of the Bourbons was violent and sanguinary, because it was weak.

There were conspiracies of different sorts during the nine or ten first years of the restoration. From 1923 or 1824 until 1830, no one conspired; everybody held himself in readiness for an event which could not fail to arrive soon or late. Those conspiracies, in which the army had no part, were without any solid foundation; they could accomplish nothing. It was only towards 1818 that the secret societies, perceiving the insufficiency of their means, commenced by making proselytes in the army; the conspiracies then became

more serious.

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There existed in almost every regiment a strongly marked line of demarcation between the officers who had been attached to the old army, and those who had been created by the new government; a fusion had only been effected in a very few corps, whose officers were, by accident, men of firmness and intelligence. At the period of the pretended organization of the duke of Feltre, as I have before stated, the old officers had been almost entirely excluded. They were afterwards gradually recalled by Marshal Gouvion Saint Cyr and General Latour Maubourg. But they had then passed several years at their own firesides; the greater part had endured cruel privations. Many had been objects of persecution to the inferior agents of the government, who are always sufficiently disposed to exhibit any evidence of their zeal. They thus returned with their feelings soured; but yet, had they found in their new companions that fraternal feeling which prevailed in the old regiments, and which constituted them, as it were, into one family, their regrets might have been calmed, and their resentments extinguished.

all of them were in the situation I have just described; were engaged in the conspiracies under the restoration; and it will be easily understood, that with these regi

ments, the emissaries of the secret societies would naturally find a favorable reception.

The military conspiracy of August, 1820, was the restoration. Discovered on the 19th or 19th of August, most important of all those which broke out under the ferred to the court of peers. This conspiracy was it was, by a royal ordinance of the 25th or 28th, renever well understood, though the persons engaged in it were solemnly arraigned, and six weeks of debates

were wasted on it. Was it that there was no wish to discover the truth? that there were, besides those accused, accomplices too exalted to be attacked? that the magistrates charged with the process were misled? This is a matter which I will not undertake to decide. There is one thing, however, certain: the conspiracy was not at all investigated.

From the commencement of the process, a voluntary or involuntary error had been committed. When this error had been once committed, the truth soon disappeared, and a gigantic conspiracy was soon reduced to the dwarfish proportions of a barracks' plot. The conspiracy was to have broken out simultaneously at Cambray and Paris. The movement proposed at Paris was regarded as the principal, and that of Cambray as a mere appendage to the former. To get at the truth, the opposite course should have been followed-the movement at Cambray have been regarded as the principal one, and that of Paris as nothing but an accessary, for the purpose of diverting the attention of the government from what was going on elsewhere. In attaching the movement of Paris to that of Cambray, and not the conspiracy of Cambray to that of Paris, the ramifications of the conspiracy would have been naturally disclosed. It would have been seen that all the strong places of the north were engaged in the plot, But such was not the case; the chiefs were no longer with ten regiments, cavalry and artillery. The treaty men who had been but recently soldiers. They were of 1815 would have been seen violated by an alliance quasi-great nobles, (I beg it will be remembered that with Belgium, of soldier with soldier; two thrones I speak of 1818; things were, I know, afterwards | would have been seen menaced by the same conspiracy, changed,) whose inaction during twenty years, and those of France and the Low Countries; and such

a plot would have been worthy of the deliberations | fend itself even in Paris, would have been unable to of the court of peers, while that which was submit-detach any of the forces assembled in the capital, and ted to it was but a farce. The accused, confident of that a rapid march upon Paris would have encountered almost perfect impunity, could mock at their ease, little or no opposition. accusers, witnesses and judges.

All this was extremely well combined. But there This conspiracy had been framed with much skill; exists a fatal principle in all conspiracies, destined to it failed in consequence of the hesitation of its chiefs produce the failure of thousands: It is the necessity of Though discovered twenty-four or thirty-six hours be- proselytism—that want, which all conspirators feel, of fore the time fixed for its breaking out, its extension enlarging their circle-of associating first one friend was so great that, though foreseen, it might have pro-and then another, with the happy chances of the future. duced incalculable embarrassment. The conspirators The officers and sub-officers of the infantry regiments had for their chief a lieutenant-colonel who had belong-of the garrison of Paris, had successfully attempted ed to the imperial guard, himself subordinate to other to attach to their plan the officers and sub-officers of chiefs, such as are indistinctly seen behind the curtain the royal guard; they had also secured some half-pay in all conspiracies, but who disappear at the moment of officers. In thus regularly enlarging the circle of their their failure. Besides all these, a large number of gene- accomplices, they might naturally calculate upon meetrals, several of whom belonged to the chamber of peers ing with some agent of the police, and so in fact they and the chamber of deputies, had promised their adhe- did. When the plot was once discovered, denunciasion and co-operation, but only after the execution of tions arrived in abundance, even from those who had the plan had been commenced, and its efforts had been participated in the conspiracy, but who were now desicrowned by a first success. rous of making a merit of their return to the government, thus securing a pardon for the past. The conspirators of Paris were arrested while in bed, on the night preceding the day fixed for the execution of the plot.

The plan was to raise on the night between the 19th and 20th of August, two regiments, one of infantry, the other of cavalry, forming the garrison of Cambray. The subaltern officers of these two regiments were in At Cambray, everything was prepared for action, the interest of the conspirators; and the soldiers would but a delay of twenty-four hours appeared necessary have followed without hesitation their subaltern officers. to the chief, and this delay destroyed everything; for it The two regiments were then to unite themselves at allowed time for the receipt of the news from the capiDouai, to two other corps, one of infantry and the tal. In a conspiracy, every one has not the same other of artillery; they were to seize upon the stores of determination. The arrests which had been effected in the arsenal, and, increasing their numbers in passing the capital, had the effect of intimidating a few weak Valenciennes by the addition of the regiment of dra-men, who saw in them the destruction of everything. goons in garrison at that place, to have effected a junction on the frontier of Belgium, with a corps of four thousand Belgians, who were to have met them at a given hour and day.

The conspiracy was, in consequence, denounced to the commandant of the place; who, from that moment, and I think, somewhat against his will, was forced to take the measures necessary to prevent the accomplishment It has been said, but I have no certain information of of the plot. Some arrests were ordered by him, but after the fact, that a prince of the royal family of the Low a long enough period, and in such a manner, as to allow Countries had promised his assistance, and that he the individuals most seriously compromised, time to efwould have placed himself at the head of the four fect their escape. Five officers, in fact, left Cambray in thousand Belgians. Many of the conspirators were the disguise of wagoners, and fled into Belgium. The convinced of the truth of this statement; and it was escape of the one who set off last, was effected in a perhaps in consequence of the discovery of this pro- peculiar way. It was Sunday, and the regiment was mised participation, that it was determined to tear off at mass; an armed platoon occupied the nave of the but a part of the veil which concealed the conspiracy. church. The colonel had just ordered the officer who It will be seen, after what I have stated, that in less commanded this platoon to arrest, on leaving the than twelve hours, a little army of at least ten thousand church, and to conduct to the citadel, one of his commen might have been formed. It would have been rades, whom he pointed out. The officer who was to quickly augmented by all the accessions promised by be arrested was in the choir, at the lower extremity of the regiments or parts of regiments of the garrisons of the groupe formed by the staff of the regiment. At a the North, of the Pas-de-Calais and of the Somme; moment when every one had his face inclined to the and in this condition, appealing to the army and the earth, the officer charged to effect the arrest, approachpeople, it would have commenced its march upon Paris. ed his comrade and whispered in his ear, I must arrest It had appeared advisable to throw some embarrass-you on leaving the church; save yourself. The latter did ment in the way of the government at the moment that not wait to have the caution repeated; a half-hour the conspiracy was to break out; that, compelled to di- afterwards, he was out of the city. vide its means, it might be unable to oppose itself suc- The five officers who fled into Belgium, and who cessfully against the march of the army of the conspira- had been received by the Belgians as brothers, were not tors. It was with this view that the conspiracy of long in being delivered up by the government of the Paris had been got up; it was to break out at the same Low Countries. They had fairly risked their lives, moment as that of Cambray. The first act of the and when brought to Paris, only thought of dying regiment of the garrison of Paris would have been to courageously. They expected to be handed over to a possess itself of Vincennes, an understanding having council of war, and to be despatched in three days. It been effected with certain persons in that place. It was only after the first interrogatories had been prowill thus be seen that the government, obliged to de-pounded to them, that they discovered that the govern

ment did not desire to ascertain the truth, or at least that it did not seek it in the only way in which it could be found. Arraigned before a council of war, and despairing of any escape, they would have freely confessed their plans. But as soon as they discovered that they were only examined about matters of which they were ignorant, and that no questions were propounded to them about anything that they really understood, they held themselves upon the defensive, and guarded themselves by systematically denying everything. Some confessions were obtained with much difficulty; but so isolated as to be of no real importance.

The court of peers conducted itself throughout this affair with great humanity and moderation. It is only necessary that a political process should be protracted a long time to secure such a result; for, as there is nothing vile or shameful in a political crime, when the judges and the accused have been many months together, a kindness of feeling naturally springs up between them, and a heavy condemnation becomes, in consequence, almost impossible. If the chamber of peers had desired to act with severity, and to apply the law in all its rigor, the conspiracy of 1820 would have brought thirty heads to the scaffold. There was but one condemnation to imprisonment for ten years, two for five years, and three for two years. The accused had secured themselves a party in the chamber of peers, and the chief of this party was General, now Marshal Maison. He pushed his good will towards them so far as to take upon himself to propound interrogatories to the witnesses, which the prisoners would not have dared to do themselves, and which were transmitted to him, by them, in writing.

According to its custom, the court had appointed a committee for the preliminary examination. General Rapp formed a part of it. An officer of my acquaintance had been brought before him. The general thus examined him:

What was your business on such a day and such an hour on the esplanade of the citadel of Cambray ?

General, since I must avow the fact, I was waiting for a young woman.

It appeared that this was the common excuse of all the officers of the garrison of Cambray. The general replied:

You belong to a singular regiment; all the officers attached to it would seem to pass their lives in running after women.

Nearly all of the examinations consisted of conversations about as serious as that which I have just reported.

Now let it be supposed that the court of peers had perceived, or had wished to have perceived the truth, and had investigated the conspiracy in its natural order, what an immense field would have been opened! The result of the actual examinations only established a conspiracy perfectly inexplicable.

I cannot conclude this chapter without reporting a singular answer returned by a witness to a question of General Maison. The witness was Count Léon de Juigné, colonel of the regiment of infantry in garrison at Cambray. The chancellor, the president of the court of peers, had examined him upon the subject of the political opinions professed by such of

the prisoners as belonged to his regiment. He had replied that generally they thought badly.

And what do you understand, Colonel, replied General Maison, by thinking badly?

To think badly-to think badly, is to think badly. It is an expression which explains itself. But I do not, for my part, understand it, and I beg you will explain yourself.

Ah, well! to think badly, is to think like the left side (côté gauche) of the chamber of deputies.*

* Le côté gauche of the chamber is the most liberal portion of that assembly.

TO MY CIGAR.

Selected.

Yes, social friend, I love thee well,
In learned Doctors' spite;

I love thy fragrant misty spell,
I love thy calm delight.

What if they tell, with phizes long,

Our years are sooner past,

I would reply, with reasoning strong, They're sweeter while they last. And oft, mild tube, to me thou art

A monitor, though still; Thou speak'st lessons to my heart

Above the preacher's skill.

When in the evening-lonely hour-
Attended but by thee,
O'er history's varied page I pore,

Man's fate in thee I see.

Awhile like thee, the hero burns,

And smokes and fumes around; And then like thee to ashes turns,

And mingles with the ground.

Thou'rt like the man of worth, who gives,
To goodness, every day;
The fragrance of whose virtues lives,
When he has passed away.

Oft when the snowy column grows
And breaks and falls away,

I trace how mighty realms thus rose,
Then tumbled to decay.

From beggar's frieze to monarch's robe
One common doom is passed;
Sweet nature's works—the mighty globe,
Must all burn out at last.

And what is he that smokes thee now?
A little moving heap,
That soon like thee to fate must bow,

Like thee in dust must sleep.
And when I see thy smoke roll high,
Thy ashes downward go,
'Tis thus methinks my soul shall fly,
Thus leave my body low.

FRAGMENT.

They struck thee when they smiled the most;
They taught thee what thy heart had lost;
They bade thee hope for better things,
Yet barbed each word they spoke with stings.

Wilt thou not fly?-in other lands,
Thy spirit may renew its bands;

Its hurts restore, and haply, heal

The wound, that here, thou still must feel.

I do not ask thee love again;

Too well I know the thought is pain—

Yet, if the heart that's truly thine,

Be worthy thee, then cherish mine.

Long years ago, thou hadst its vow;
Most truly it renews it now ;-

When youth has fled thy form, oh, see,
It comes, in all its youth, to thee!

Though threat'ning tones would fain affright,
And bitter looks and thoughts would blight,
I come once more with fondest will,
To love to suffer with thee still.

Oh, fly with me! If I thus blest,

With home, and there a cherish'd guest,
Can thus that home, that homage, fly,
With thee to mourn, to toil, to die ;-

Sure then, thus scorned by all that knew,
Thus doom'd to slight, to shame, to wo,
Can well forget the world once known,
And fly to love so much thine own.

THE COPY-BOOK.
NO. III.

THE POPULATION OF THE WEST.

E.

It might be supposed that the fact of a man's emigrating to the west, was presumptive evidence of his possessing an energetic turn of mind; that a man devoid of enterprise and decision, could scarcely find his way to the distant west, over steep mountains and rapid rivers. Perhaps, however, an indolent man, pinched by necessity, might prefer to seek some El-Dorado of the west, rather than delve for years in a thankless soil. In the west, however, if men are not found more energetic, they are much shrewder than in the older states. In the older states things have comparatively settled down and assumed their level.

In the west the process of fermentation is now at work; there is a very free interchange of opinion between all classes of people-a large amount of intelligence is in circulation.

if they had remained in the quarter whence they came, might have adhered to them for life.

There seems to be more equality in the new than in the old states: men being in a measure strangers to one another, stand on their merits, and few will presume to claim precedence above the rest: aristocracy is a plant that does not bear transplanting. There is then in the west a great deal of familiarity between all classes of people; but it must be observed, that this familiarity, which grows out of the circumstances of the country, has its limits. A may be very familiar with B, in the streets, or at the court-house, or the tavern, and yet never invite him to his house-nor will B ever expect him so to do. It is tacitly understood, there is to be a footing of equality, but it is to be under limitations, thus far, and no farther.

Lastly, on this head, when I say there is much social equality, I mean much, considering how much the southern institutions tend to depress mechanical trades and the inferior orders, and to build up an aristocracy of wealth.

The laws of the new states are highly democratic, as they ought to be, but the democratic principle may be pushed to such an extreme as to defeat its own purpose, the substance may be sacrificed to the shadow. Thus if the election of all officers, civil and military, is committed to the people, it will either constitute a heavy tax on their time, or, what will probably happen, the election will fall into the hands of a minority, composed too, perhaps, of the less informed part of the community.

Electioneering is also a great evil in this part of the union—a system, the result of which often is, that a man is elected not on account of honesty or capacity, but on account of his agreeable manners; and sometimes, what is far worse, an unworthy candidate triumphs over his competitors by a series of falsehood, shuffling and intrigue.

These remarks are made in reference to Alabama, but are perhaps applicable more or less to several other similar states.

THE VILLAGE IN THE WEST.

It adds much to the consequence of a village for it to be the county seat. It then becomes the mirror of the county, collecting and reflecting the rays. Here the courts hold their sessions, and elections take place. To the village, the people of the country repair, to patronise merchant, mechanic, doctor, lawyer. Thus a continual communication is kept up between town and country, and thus all the news of the country is conveyed to town, and all the news of town conveyed to the country. But as news is more common in town than in country, so the country people appear more curious than those in town, and it is a sort of proverbial expression to go to the country to hear the news.

There is a remarkable degree of familiarity among all classes in a western village, and they occupy a great deal of their leisure in out of door chat. In these converzationes everything is discussed. Many questions which in the old states are settled beyond debate, are matter of discussion in the west.

The population being made up of persons from different quarters, bringing with them variant opinions Besides courts and elections, the court-house is and prepossessions, a sort of effervescense naturally occasionally occupied as a place of worship. Indeed it results; and thus many prejudices are thrown off, which is put to a variety of uses, according to the exigency

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