Before a shallow seething wave Upon the roofe we sate that night, Stream from the church-tower, red and high,-A lurid mark and dread to see: And awesome bells they were to me, That in the dark rang "Enderby." They rang the sailor-lads to guide From roofe to roofe, who fearless rowed; And yet he moaned beneath his breath, And didst thou visit him no more? Thou didst, thou didst, my daughter deare; Ere yet the early dawn was clear. To manye more than myne and me: I shall never hear her more By the reedy Lindis shore, From the meads where melick groweth, I shall never see her more Where the reeds and rushes quiver, Shiver, quiver; Stand beside the sobbing river, Quit your cowslips, cowslips yellow; Come uppe, Whitefoot, come uppe, Lightfoot; Come uppe Lightfoot, rise and follow; From your clovers lift the head; Come uppe, Jetty, follow, follow, Jetty, to the milking-shed." Jean Ingelow. 272 —CHARACTER OF MR. PITT. WM. ROBERTSON. The secretary stood alone. Modern degeneracy had not reached him. Original and unaccommodating, the features of his character had the hardihood of antiquity. His august mind overawed majesty itself. No state chicanery, no narrow system of vicious politics, no idle contest for ministerial victories, sank him to the vulgar level of the great; but overbearing, persuasive, and impracticable, his object was England, his ambition was fame. Without dividing, he destroyed party; without corrupting, he made a venal age unanimous. France sunk beneath him. With one hand he smote the house of Bourbon, and wielded in the other the democracy of England. The sight of his mind was infinite; and his schemes were to affect, not England, not the present age only, but Europe and posterity. The ordinary feelings which make life amiable and indolent were unknown to him. No domestic difficulties, no domestic weakness, reached him; but aloof from the sordid occurrences of life, and unsullied by its intercourse, he came occasionally into our system, to counsel and to decide. A character so exalted, so strenuous, so various, so authoritative, astonished a corrupt age, and the treasury trembled at the name of Pitt, through all classes of venality. Corruption imagined, indeed, that she had found defects in this statesman, and talked much of the inconsistency of his glory, and much of the ruin of his victories; but the history of his country, and the calamities of the enemy, answered and refuted her. Nor were his political his only talents. His eloquence was an era in the senate; peculiar and spontaneous; familiarly expressing gigantic sentiments and instructive wisdom; nut like the torrent of Demosthenes, or the splendid conflagration of Tully; it resembled sometimes the thunder, and sometimes the music of the spheres. He did not conduct the understanding through the painful subtlety of argumentation, nor was he ever on the rack of exertion; but rather lightened upon the subject, and reached the point by the flashings of the mind, which, like those of the eye, were felt, but couid not be followed. Upon the whole, there was in this man something that could create, subvert, or reform; an understanding, a spirit, and an eloquence, to summon mankind to society, or to break the bonds of slavery asunder, and to rule the wildness of free minds with unbounded authority; something that could establish or overwhelm empires, and strike a blow in the world that should resound through the universe. 273.-THE POWER OF CONSCIENCE. DANIEL WEBSTER. of An aged man, without an enemy in the world, in his own house, and in his own bed, is made the victim of a butcherly murder, for mere pay. The fatal blow is given, and the victim passes, without a struggle or a motion, from the repose sleep to the repose of death. It is the assassin's purpose to make sure work. He explores the wrist for the pulse. He feels for it, and ascertains that it beats no longer. It is accomplished. The deed is done. He retreats, retraces his steps to the window, passes out through it as he came in, and escapes. He has done the murder-no eye has seen him, no ear has heard him. The secret is his own-and it is safe. Ah, gentlemen, that was a dreadful mistake! Such a secret can be safe nowhere. The whole creation of God has neither nook nor corner where the guilty can bestow it, and say it is safe. Not to speak of that eye which glances through all disguises, and beholds everything as in the splendor of noon, such secrets of guilt are never safe from detection, even by men. True it is, generally speaking, that "murder will out." True it is, that Providence hath so ordained, and doth so govern things, that those who break the great law of Heaven, by shedding man's blood, seldom succeed in avoiding discovery. Especially in a case exciting so much attention as this, discovery must come, and will come, sooner or later. A thousand eyes turn at once to explore every man, every thing, every circumstance connected with the time and place; a thousand ears catch every whisper; a thousand excited minds intensely dwell on the scene, shedding all their light, and ready to kindle the slightest circumstance into a blaze of discovery. Meantime, the guilty soul cannot keep its own secret. It is false to itself; or rather, it feels an irresistible impulse of conscience to be true to itself. It labors under its guilty possession, and knows not what to do with it. The human heart was not made for the residence of such an inhabitant. It finds itself preyed on by a torment, which it dares not acknowledge to God nor man. A vulture is devouring it, and it can ask no sympathy or assistance, either from Heaven or earth. The secret which the murderer possesses soon comes to possess him; and, like the evil spirits of which we read, it overcomes him, and leads him whithersoever it will. He feels it beating at his heart, rising to his throat, and demanding disclosure. He thinks the whole world sees it in his face, reads it in his eyes, and almost hears its working in the very silence of his thoughts. It has become his master. It betrays his discretion, it breaks down his courage, it conquers his prudence. When suspicions from without begin to embarrass him, and the net of circumstance to entangle him, the fatal secret struggles, with still greater violence, to burst forth. It must be confessed-it will be confessed-there is no refuge from confession but suicide-and suicide is confession! 274.-SCHOOL. BEFORE SCHOOL. 'Quarter of nine! Boys and girls, do you hear?" I can't say my table!" "Oh, find me my cap!" 'Be good, dear." "I'll try.' Nine times nine's eighty-one." AFTER SCHOOL. "Don't wake up the baby! Come gently, my dear." 'I've got such a toothache!" "The teacher's unfair!” "Is dinner most ready? I'm just like a bear!" Be patient, worn mother, they're growing up fast; 275.-OVER THE RIVER. N. A. W. PRIEST. Over the river they beckon to me Loved ones who've crossed to the farther side; But their voices are drowned in the rushing tide. And eyes the reflection of heaven's own blue; And the pale mist hid him from mortal view My brother stands waiting to welcome me! Over the river the boatman pale Carried another-the household pet: Her brown curls waved in the gentle gale- She crossed on her bosom her dimpled hands, My childhood's idol is waiting for me. For none return from those quiet shores Who cross with the boatman cold and pale; We hear the dip of the golden oars, And catch a gleam of the snowy sail, And lo! they have passed from our yearning heart; |