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upon a youthful, ardent, and ambitious people.

It is not to be supposed that any particular moment in Washington's life has been chosen by the sculptor as the theme or subject of his work. On the other hand, the artist has not erred by attempting to supply a mere portrait statue of the man. As we have intimated, it aims to embody the Prudence, the Conservatism, which characterized Washington as well in his private as in his public relations. Washington's life was a life of self-restraint. His biographers are careful to tell us that he never laughed, never moved hastily, rarely showed anger-although he enjoyed a joke, was an active man in perfect health, and of a very quick temper. Albert Dürer has drawn Fortune, with a goblet in one hand, and a bridle in the other. Washington lived what Dürer drew. All his life he held the cup in his hand, but he put the bridle upon his desire to taste it, and Fortane crowned him with her noblest wreath. If, then, he was distinguished by the predominance of one characteristic, it was that of self-restraint. And he saw that selfrestraint was the great want of his countrymen-that their political and social ambition, unchecked by wisdom, would lead them into unnumbered difficulties.

Washington will stand before us daily in the fall sunlight, and amid the prosperous spleador of our city, for ever preach to us the Gospel of Prudence. It is, perhaps, a homely lesson; and there are many who will find fault with a work of Art for preaching any other Gospel than that of Beauty merely. But it is our conviction that Art was meant for more than this-that it can serve, and has served, a higher ministryand that in this very work, to seek no further for an illustration, the artist has wisely seen how poor a substitute for a noble motive, and the perpetual inculcation of a vital truth would have been even the most successful combination of light and shade, the grandest draperies, and the most masterly display of the profoundest anatomical knowledge-wrought into marble, to win admiration for themselves alone.

- The Crystalotype.-The valuable work which, under the name of "The World of Art and Industry, an Illustrated Record of the Great Exhibition," did our designers, engravers and the publisher so mach credit, appears under a new name, which it derives from the addition of a number of fine photographs or crystalotypes,

representing some of the pieces of sculpture exhibited in the New York Crystal Palace. These make the work much more valuable. The "Flora," by Crawford is a treasure indeed, and the Sleeping Children" has a tender beauty of its own. "The Soldier's Son," and "the Industrious Girl," please children old and young, but they are scarcely so pretty in these photographic copies, as in the marble originals. They lose none of their naturalness, however, in this style of reproduction.

-The December number of "The Illustrated Magazine of Art," had a valuable article describing the fresco of Raphael in Florence, discovered in 1842, and finally identified in 1845. This article is illustrated with several wood-cuts; a sketch of the whole composition-serving to show the arrangement of the figures-and seven of the heads, admirably drawn to a large scale. The head of Christ is seen to be of a very noble type-and although the conception leans to beauty rather than to power, it is far from being deficient in strength and manliness. This one article, with its illustrations, is well worth more than the price of the whole subscription to the magazine, which is one of the most valuable serial publications that we have.

- The Crayon.-The first number of this long-promised, and, as we believe, anxiously looked for, Art Journal, was published on the 3d January. We regret that the early day on which we are obliged to go to press, will postpone the utterance of our New Year welcome to the handsome stranger, until the first of March, when several numbers will have been issued, and judged by the public. But we will say our "say," nevertheless, and let our good intentions make amends.

"The Crayon" is beautifully printed, on clear white paper, and has a quiet elegance about it, which is very pleasant to contemplate. It would be unfair to attempt any judgment of its merits at this early stageand with so substantial a beginning, everything that is good may be hoped for.

We need such a Journal as "The Crayon," without any question, and there never has been a better time for starting it than the present. With its very reasonable subscription price-three dollars by the year, and it is published every week--with its clear paper and print-there is no reason why its publication should not be a successful undertaking. At the same time, it ought to be always remembered that the

American people cannot be expected to respond cordially to any periodical treating of the Fine Arts, which has not a sterling common sense for its animating principle. This seemingly commonplace basis of treatment is not inconsistent with the highest standard. It only claims that if there is a good reason for anything asserted or denied, that reason ought to be clearly and intelligently given. We have been bullied long enough by amateurs and connoisseurs. We are tired of being kicked by Mr. Ruskin and his peers, and demand that we should be treated as gentlemen and men. Will the Crayon help us to what we want?

BOOKS RECEIVED.

NOTES ON DUELS AND DUELLING, alphabetically arranged, with a Preliminary Historical Essay. By Lorenzo Sabine. Boston: Crosby, Nichols & Co. 12mo., pp. 394.

BROTHER JONATHAN'S COTTAGE; or, A Friend to the Fallen. By Henry H. Tator. New York: Francis Hart. 12mo., pp. 235.

FUDGE DOINGS: being Tony Fudge's Record of the Same. By Ik. Marvel. New York: Charles Scribner. 2 vols. 12mo., pp. 235 and 257.

THE FOREST EXILES; or, the Perils of a Peruvian Family amid the Wilds of the Amazon. By Capt. Mayne Reid. Illustrated. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 12mo., pp. 360.

COUNTRY LIFE, and Other Stories. By Cousin Mary. Illustrated. Boston: Phillips, Sampson & Co. 12mo., pp. 168.

THE ANGEL CHILDREN; or, Stories from Cloud-land. By Charlotte M. Higgins. Boston: Phillips, Sampson & Co. 12mo. pp. 184.

UPS AND DOWNS; or Silver Lake Sketches. By Cousin Cicely. New York: J. C. Derby. 12mo., pp. 341.

ROMANCE OF BIOGRAPHY, illustrated in the Lives of
Historic Personages. Edited by Rev. F. L. Hawks,
D. D. Richard, the Lion-Hearted. New York:
Evans & Dickerson. 12mo., pp. 273.
HAGAR, THE MARTYR; or, Passion and Reality
Tale of the North and South. By Mrs. H. Marion
Stephens. Boston: W. P. Fetridge & Co. 12mo.,
pp. 360.

A

LILIES AND VIOLETS; or, Thoughts in Prose and Verse, on the True Graces of Maidenhood. By Rosalie Bell. New York: J. C. Derby. 12mo., pp. 442.

EXAMINATION OF THE PRINCIPLES OF BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION OF ERNESTI, &c.: A Treatise on the Figures of Speech. A treatise on the right and duty of all men to read the Scriptures. By Alexander Carson, LL. D. New York: Edward H. Fletcher. 12mo., pp. 468.

THE JUDGMENTS OF GOD UPON THE NATIONS. Pius Ninth, the Last of the Popes. New York: E. H. Fletcher. 12mo., pp. 135.

LITERARY FABLES OF YRIARTE. Translated from the Spanish. By Geo. H. Devereux. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 12mo., pp. 145.

NELLY BRACKEN; a Tale of Forty Years Ago. By Annie Chambers Bradford. Philadelphia: Lippincott, Grambo & Co. 12mo., pp. 877.

SERMONS; chiefly Practical. By the senior Minister of the West Church, in Boston. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 12mo., pp. 862.

MAY AND DECEMBER; A Tale of Wedded Life. By Mrs. Hubback. Philadelphia: Lippincott, Grambo & Co. 2 vols. 12mo., pp. 270 and 250.

THE AMERICAN SPORTSMAN; containing hints to sportsmen, notes on shooting, and the habits of the game-birds and wild fowl of America. By Elisha J. Lewis, M. D. Illustrated. Philadelphia Lippincott, Grambo & Co. Svo., pp. 494. Phillips, Sampson & Co.'s Catalogue of Publications. The Bible PRAYER-BOOK; for Family Worship, and for other private and public occasions. By W. W. Everts. New York: Ivison & Phinney. 12mo., pp. 244. HISTORY AND OBSERVATIONS ON ASIATIC CHOLERA IN BROOKLYN, N. Y. IN 1854. By J. C. Hutchison, M. D. [From the New York Journal of Medicine.] New York. Stitched, 12mo., pp. 24.

THE POETICAL WORKS OF THOMAS HOOD; with a biographical sketch. Edited by Epes Sargent. Boston: Phillips, Sampson & Co. 12mo., pp. 490. THR AMERICAN ALMANAC, and Repository of Useful Knowledge, for the year 1855. Boston: Phillips, Sampson & Co. 12mo., pp. 352.

MY COURTSHIP AND ITS CONSEQUENCES. By Henry Wikoff. New York: J. C. Derby. 12mo., pp. 438.

CORNELL'S PRIMARY GEOGRAPHY, forming part first of a systematic series of school geographies. By S. S. Cornell. New York: D. Appleton & Co. Small Svo., pp. 96.

"FATHER CLARK," or, The Pioneer Preacher, Sketches and incidents of Rev. John Clark, by an Old Pioneer. New York: Sheldon, Lamport, & Blakeman. 12mo., pp. 287.

A THIRD GALLERY OF PORTRAITS. By George Gilfillan. New York: Sheldon, Lamport & Blakeman. WOLFERT'S ROOST, and other papers, now first collected. By Washington Irving. New York: G. P. Putnam & Co. 12mo., pp. 888.

NOTE. The letter from a correspondent on the affairs of the Smithsonian Institution, which appeared in our last number, being given merely as an ex-parte statement of opinion on the topics under consideration, and from a respectable source, was printed without careful scrutiny. We take no part in the controversybut we presume our respectable correspondent will regret, as we do, the admission of one paragraph, at least, grossly and unnecessarily offensive to the memory of Smithson.-EDITOR.

PUTNAM'S MONTHLY.

I Magazine of Literature, Science. and Art.

VOL. V.-APRIL, 1853.-NO. XXVIII.

A TRIP TO THE MOON.

THE HE huge bell of the cathedral rang out midnight. Like clear crystal drops fell the transparent silver notes from the bright sky, as if they were echoes of angels' voices. Behind the dusky mountains rose the full orb of the moon in golden splendor, and poured its fairy light over the vast plain. Faint hazy mists swept across the valley, and slowly the pale gossamer light sank deeper into the dark narrow streets of the city. Like a gigantic churchyard lay the silent town at the feet of the mysterious globe in the high heavenseach house a coffin in which slept a thousand joys or sorrows. Only through one low window shone the feeble glimmer of a night-lamp. A mother was watching her sickly babe; fierce fever glared in its glowing face and burning eyes, and restlessly the poor child tossed from side to side. At last it grew quiet, and seemed to slumber. The mother stepped to the window and looked with tearful eye up to the moon. A feeling of deepest loneliness chilled her sinking heart; all around her slept ten thousands in happy peace; the wicked had ceased from troubling and the weary were at rest; she only watched with anguish the flickering life of her beloved.

"Oh," she sighed, "how peaceful and happy it must be up there in the silvery light of the moon! There is peace in her pale even light, quiet happiness in her calm, unbroken pilgrimage through the dark blue heavens!" And she wished she could wander in her sweet meadows and rest by her still waters. She prayed, half dreaming, half awake, that her soul might, hereafter, be allowed to rest from VOL. V.-22

the pain and sorrow of earthly life, in the calm sweet light of the moon, praising God and enjoying the peace that knows no end.

For so we dream, even in our day, of paradisiacal peace and mysterious charms in the moon; as thousands of years ago, the nations of the earth revered in her a godlike being, who lighted up the long, sad nights with her sweet, silvery light, and in chaste beauty, wove strange spells. over the hearts of men. They built temples in honor of the goddess, priests sang her praises in mighty anthems, sacrifices won her favor and disarmed her just wrath. Lofty were her thrones in the far East; Asia and the world worshiped her, and great was the Diana of the Ephesians!

This faith, like alas! many a better faith, is found no longer among men. Superstition, alone, has remained. The Chinese beats his drums and gongs to keep the dragon from swallowing up his moon at the time of an eclipse, and the Wallachian peasant sees in her pale, faint glimmer how the vampire rises from his brother's grave. With us the telescope has stripped the moon of her divine attributes, and dry, sober calculations have torn all strange fancies and gay charms from the humble satellite of the earth.

Now the moon is simply a little globe, not much larger than America, so that the longest journey, that could be undertaken there, would explore Asia from end to end. We can easily get there, for she is only about 240,000 miles from us, a mere trifle in comparison with the distance of the nearest star. Will you

accompany us? There is no luggage required, for there are plenty of castles in the air, and as for provisions, have not our very first lessons taught us the precious substance of which the moon is made? Passengers are not expected to travel with a huge telescope under the arm, and a book of logarithms in their hand. We leave that to the munificent Earl of Rosse, who compels the chaste goddess to come down within the familiar distance of three hundred miles, even to bold Ireland! We have, besides, cunning astronomers, who marshal with ease millions of numbers, and command the poor planets to appear in given places, threatening to deny their identity, if they do not appear within the minute. We are simple travellers, and, I fear, would not disdain a beanstalk, if we thought it the shortest road to heaven.

Once, on the moon, however, we are immediately struck with awe and wonder at the strange landscapes that we suspected from below, even with unarmed eyes, in the dark and light spots on the moon's disc. Now the grey portions become plains, the light ones mountains. That these brilliant spots are mountains, we know from their shadows, which always fall on the side opposite the sun, and which lengthen in precise proportion as the sun sinks lower. The most dazzling points, however, are not mountains but towering precipices, whose steep, smooth sides reflect the light with greatest force.

But how entirely different is this mountain scenery from that of the Alps or the Andes! Here we see no lofty, snow-covered peaks, no long, pleasing ridges and lovely valleys; not even the proud domes of the Cordilleras with their steep terraces are here represented. The whole surface of the moon is covered with circular walls, inclosing deep, dark caverns into which whole territories have sunk with their hills and mountains. Some of these huge abysses are more than fifty miles in diameter, others spread still wider, but all are engirt at the top by great walls of rock, which are serrated and often crowned by lofty peaks. The smallest and most regular are called craters, from their resemblance to the craters of the earth, but the form Volcanoes is all they have in common.

the moon does not know, and the shin-
ing points on her night side, which Her-
schel loved so much to observe, are only
the highest points of lofty mountains,
resplendent in brilliant sunshine.

On the southwestern part of the disc
we see one of those gigantic, elevated
the moon
tablelands, with which

abounds. They are evidently the oldest
formations, fearfully torn and tarnished
in every direction, full of craters, fissures
and fractures and traversed by long fur-
row-like valleys; but in their midst we
see, invariably, a most beautiful variety
of landscapes, such as our earth boasts
of: groups of mountains, broad, vast
plains, gently swelling ridges, and fair
valleys, dotted with numerous, well-
rounded hills.

By their side we notice one of those
regular, and therefore probably more
recent circular mountains, of which
more than 1,500 are already known, and
which, in some parts of the moon, stand
so closely packed together, as to give to
these regions the appearance of a honey-
comb. Their walls are nearly all around
of the same height; within, their
straight, steep sides sink suddenly into
the abyss; without they fall off more
gradually in terraces, and send occasional
spurs into the surrounding country. In
the centre there rises commonly an iso-
lated peak, sometimes merely a humble
hill, at other times a lofty mountain or
even a small cluster of conical eminences.
These central heights never rise to a
level with the circular ranges; some are
nearly 5000 feet high, but then the impass-
able wall, that surrounds them without
breach or pass, and shuts them off from
the rest of the universe, towers aloft to
the amazing height of 17,000 feet!

If the number of these circular mountains is so great, that of small, burnt out craters is still more astounding; even a moderately powerful telescope shows us some 20,000. Inside they often sink to an incredible depth, into which their walls cast a deep, everlasting shadow, or where there reigns entire gloom, which the light of the sun, even at its Their tops, highest, never reaches.

however, when fully lighted up at the time of full moon, shine in glorions splendor, reflecting the sun's rays with dazzling lustre. Others show only their margin illuminated, like a delicate ring of light, forming a magic circle around the dark, yawning crater. Now and then we see two or more strung together like rows of pearls, connected with each other by canals, or even two at a time surrounded by a common wall and combining their desolate horrors.

Long chains of mountains, like the Alps and Andes of our mother earth,

are rare in the moon, and even when met with, only short and without spurs or valleys. The longest ridge extends about 450 miles, but its peaks rise to the prodigious height of 17,000 feet. On the other hand, the moon abounds in countless, isolated cones, which in the northern half group themselves into long, broad belts. Like the thorns of a chestnut, thousands of these mountains rise suddenly from the plain, and are seen to stretch their long, gaunt arms from the outline of the moon's disk into the dark sky. Even the vast plains of our little neighbor are covered with long, curiously-formed ranges of low hills, which, though often a mile wide, never rise beyond a thousand feet, and therefore show us their shadow only when the sun is extremely low.

As

Much as these strange forms differ from all we see on earth, we are still more struck with the quaint, mysterious fissures, narrow but deep, which pass in almost straight lines, like railways, right through plain and mountain, cut even eraters in two, and often end themselves in craters. At full moon they appear to us as lines of brilliant light, at other times as black threads, and must, therefore, have a width of at least a thousand feet. We have, on earth, nothing to compare with them; for even the terrible gullies which cross the prairies of Texas, dwindle into utter nothingness by the side of these gigantic rents. long as men saw every day new surprising analogies between the moon and the earth, and the grey spots were oceans, the light ones continents, these inexplicable lines also appeared now as rivers and now as canals, or even as beautifully Macadamized turnpikes! The citizens of the moon can, however, hardly yet afford building roads, by water or by land, of sach gigantic width; nor will the fact, that these deep furrows cut through craters and lofty mountains, and invariably preserve the same level, admit of such an interpretation. At all events those only can see canals and roads on the moon, who have already found there cities and fortified places.

What gigantic and astounding revolutions must have passed over the moon, to produce these colossal mountains, rising not unfrequently to a height of 26,000 feet; these peculiar, massive rings, these enormous cliffs and furrows! How insignificant appear, in comparison, the greatest events of that kind, on our earth, where even proud Etna hardly

rivals the smallest of the moon's craters! Their universal tendency to round forms has led to the idea that all these elevations and indentations are the effect of one and the same mysterious power. Everything favors the presumption, that the moon was originally a liquid mass, and that, whilst it became solid, new forces were unloosened in the interior, causing gigantic eruptions, as when the pent up air bubbles up from a mass of molten metal. Some of these bubbles would upon bursting, naturally leave behind a circular ridge and a slight rise in the centre of the cavity. These forces seem to have been most active near the poles whose desolate regions are dotted over with countless hills and mountains; near the equator vast plains stretch out, broken only here and there by a lofty peak or solitary crater. Thus man, pigmy man, ventures already to read the riddles of mysterious events that happened in the earliest times of its history in a great world, which his foot has never yet trodden! He has, however, not only measured the mountains of the moon, and laid out maps and charts of her surface, but he has given names to mountains and islands. Formerly the most renowned philosophers were thus immortalized, we trust without any insidious comparison between philosophy and moonshine. Of late, however, dead or living astronomers, who often enjoyed little enough of this world's goods, have been presented with large estates in the moon. Thus Kepler, whom the great emperor and the empire of Germany suffered to starve, obtained one of the most brilliant mountains for his share; and Tycho, Copernicus, Hipparchus and Albategnius are his neighbors in those regions, though tolerably far apart on earth, in point of time, country, and religion. Even Humboldt has already his possessions in the moon.

Nothing strikes the general observer so much, when his eye rambles inquiringly over the surface of the moon, as the incredible variety of light in different parts. Some have sought the cause of this striking phenomenon in the diversity of the soil, ascribing to the darker portions a looser earth, and perceiving in the greenish sheen of some plains even traces of vegetation. Doubtful as it needs be, whether color could be seen at such a distance, this is certain, that the lighter portions represent rigid masses and reflecting elevations. A most strange sensation is produced by the long beams

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