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mercury to the tops of buildings and of mountains, and found that it fell away in exact proportion to the portion of the atmosphere left below it; and he found that water-pumps in different situations varied as to sucking power, according to the same law.

It was soon afterwards discovered, by careful observation of the mercurial barometer, that even when remaining in the same place, it did not always stand at the same elevation; in other words, that the weight of atmosphere over any particular part of the earth was constantly fluctuating; a truth which, without the barometer, could never have been suspected. The observation of the instrument being carried still further, it was found that in serene, dry weather, the mercury generally stood high, and that before and during storms and rain it fell; the instrument, therefore, might serve as a prophet of the weather, becoming a precious monitor to the husbandman or the sailor.

The reason why the barometer falls before wind and rain is that when water which has been suspended in the atmosphere, and has formed a part of it, separates as rain, the weight and bulk of the mass are diminished; and that wind must occur when a sudden condensation of aeriform matter, in any situation, disturbs the equilibrium of the air, for the air around will rush towards the situation of diminished pressure.

IMPRESSIVENESS.

Doom of the Indians.

JOSEPH STORY.

There is in the fate of these unfortunate beings, much to awaken our sympathy, and much to disturb the sobriety of our judgment; much which may be urged to excuse their own atrocities; much in their characters, which betrays us

into an involuntary admiration. What can be more melancholy than their history? By a law of their nature, they seem destined to a slow, but sure extinction. Everywhere, at the approach of the white. man, they fade away. We hear the rustling of their footsteps, like that of the withered leaves of autumn, and they are gone forever. They pass mournfully by us, and they return no more. Two centuries ago, the smoke of their wigwams and the fires of their councils rose in every valley, from Hudson's Bay to the farthest Florida, from the ocean to the Mississippi and the lakes. The shouts of victory and the war dance rang through the mountains and the glades. The thick arrows and the deadly tomahawk whistled through the forests; and the hunter's trace and dark encampment startled the wild beasts in their lairs. The warriors stood forth in their glory. The young listened to the songs of other days. The mothers played with their infants, and gazed on the scene with warm hopes of the future. The aged sat down; but they wept not. They should soon be at rest in fairer regions, where the Great Spirit dwelt, in a home prepared for the brave, beyond the western skies. Braver men never lived; truer men never drew the bow. They had courage, and fortitude, and sagacity, and perseverance, beyond most of the human race. They shrank from no dangers, and they feared no hardships. If they had the vices of savage life, they had the virtues also. They were true to their country, their friends, and their homes. If they forgave not injury, neither did they forget kindness. If their vengeance was terrible, their fidelity and generosity were unconquerable also. Their love, like their hate, stopped not on this side of the grave.

But where are they? Where are the villagers, and warriors, and youth; the Sachems and their tribes; the hunters. and their families? They have perished. They are consumed. The wasting pestilence has not alone done the mighty

work. No, nor famine, nor war. There has been a mighty power, a moral canker, which has eaten into their heartcores a plague, which the touch of the white man communicated-a poison, which betrayed them into a lingering ruin. The winds of the Atlantic fan not a single region, which they may now call their own. Already the last feeble remnants of the race are preparing for their journey beyond the Mississippi. I see them leave their miserable homes, the aged, the helpless, the women, and the warriors, "few and faint, yet fearless still." The ashes are cold on their native hearths. The smoke no longer curls round their lowly cabins. They move on with a slow, unsteady step. The white man is upon their heels, for terror, or despatch, but they heed him not. They turn to take a last look of their deserted villages. They cast a last glance upon the graves of their fathers. They shed no tears; they utter no cries; they heave no groans. There is something in their hearts which passes speech. There is something in their looks, not of vengeance or submission; but of hard necessity, which stifles both; which chokes all utterance; which has no aim or method. It is courage absorbed in despair. They linger but for a moment. Their look is onward. They have passed the fatal stream. It shall never be repassed by them,-no, never. Yet there lies not between us and them an impassable gulf. They know and feel that there is for them still one remove further, not distant, nor unseen. It is the general burial-ground of their

race.

BELIEF.
The Sword.

T. S. GRIMKE.

To the question, "what have the people ever gained but by revolution?" I answer, boldly, If by revolution be understood the law of the Sword, Liberty has lost far more than she has

ever gained by it. The Sword was the destroyer of the Lycian Confederacy and the Achæan league. The Sword alternately enslaved and disenthralled Thebes and Athens, Sparta, Syracuse and Corinth. The Sword of Rome conquered every other free State, and finished the murder of liberty in the ancient world, by destroying herself. What but the Sword, in modern times, annihilated the Republics of Italy, the Hanseatic towns, and the primitive independence of Ireland, Wales and Scotland? What but the Sword partitioned Poland, assassinated the rising liberty of Spain, banished the Huguenots from France, and made Cromwell the master, not the servant, of the people? And what but the Sword of Republican France destroyed the independence of half of Europe, deluged the continent with tears, devoured its millions upon millions, and closed the long catalogue of guilt, by founding and defending to the last the most powerful, selfish, and insatiable of military despotisms?

The Sword, indeed, delivered Greece from the Persian invaders, expelled the Tarquins from Rome, emancipated Switzerland and Holland, restored the Bruce to his throne, and brought Charles to the scaffold. And the Sword redeemed the pledge of the Congress of '76, when they plighted to each other "their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor." And yet, what would the redemption of that pledge have availed towards the establishment of our present government, if the spirit of American institutions had not been both the birthright and the birth-blessing of the colonies? The Indians, the French, the Spaniards, and even England herself, warred in vain against a people, born and bred in the household, at the domestic altar, of Liberty herself. They had never been slaves, for they were born free. The Sword was a herald to proclaim their freedom, but it neither created nor preserved it. A century and a half had already

beheld them free in infancy, free in youth, free in early manhood. Theirs was already the spirit of American institutions; the spirit of Christian freedom, of a temperate, regulated freedom, of a rational civil obedience. For such a people, the Sword, the law of violence, did and could do nothing, but sever the bonds which bound her colonial wards to their unnatural guardian. They redeemed their pledge, Sword in hand; but the Sword left them as it found them, unchanged in character,-freemen in thought and in deed, instinct with the immortal spirit of American institutions!

ACTION.

To the Young Men of Italy.

GUISEPPE MAZZINI.

Could Attilio and Emilio Bandiéra, and their fellow-martyrs, now arise from the grave and speak to you, they would, believe me, address you, though with a power very different from that given to me, in counsel not unlike that which now I utter.

Love! Love is the flight of the soul towards God; towards the great, the sublime, and the beautiful, which are the shadow of God upon earth. Love your family; the partner of your life; those around you, ready to share your joys and sorrows; the dead, who were dear to you, and to whom you were dear. Love your country. It is your name, your glory, your sign among the people. Give to it your thought, your counsel, your blood. You are twenty-four millions of men, endowed with active, splendid faculties; with a tradition of glory, the envy of the nations of Europe; an immense future is before you, your eyes are raised to the loveliest Heaven, and around you smiles the loveliest land in Europe; you are

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