here of exaggeration or private feeling-and nothing with which an indifferent and honest chronicler would not concur. Nor is it altogether idle to have dwelt so long on the personal character of this distinguished individual; for we are ourselves persuaded, that this personal character has almost done as much for the cause of science and philosophy among us, as the great talents and attainments with which it was combined and has contrib'uted, in a very eminent degree, to give to the better society in which he moved, that tone of intelligence and liberality by which it is honorably distinguished. It is not a little advantageous to philosophy that it is in fashion-and it is still more advantageous, perhaps, to the society which is led to confer on it this apparently trivial distinction. It is a great thing for the country at large-for its happiness, its prosperity, and its renown-that the upper and influencing part of its population should be made familiar, even in its untasked and social hours, with sound and liberal information, and be taught to respect those who have distinguished themselves by intellectual attainments. Nor is it, after all, a slight or despicable retvard for a man of genius to be received with honor in the highest and most elegant society around him, and to receive in his living per son that homage and applause which is too often reserved for his memory. LESSON CLXXII. The Winter Night.-BURNS. Now Phoebe, in her midnight reign, When on my ear this plaintive strain "Blow, blow, ye winds, with heavier gust! Than heaven-illumined man on brother man bestows! *o as ŭ. See stern Oppression's iron grip, Or mad Ambition's gory hand, Even in the peaceful rural vale, With all the servile wretches in the rear, Some coarser substance, unrefined, Placed for her lordly use thus far, thus vile, below. The powers you proudly own? Is there, beneath Love's noble name, O ye! who, sunk in beds of down, Whom friends and fortune quite disown! Stretched on his straw he lays himself to sleep, While, through the ragged roof and chinky wall, Chill, o'er his slumbers, piles the drifty heap :- Think on the dungeon's grim confine, heard no more; for Chanticleer Shook off the powdery snow, And hailed the morning with a cheer But deep this truth impressed my mind- LESSON CLXXIII. The American Eagle.-NEA.. THERE'S a fierce gray BIRD, with a bending beak, And ruffled and stained, while loose and bright Like the crest of a warrior, thinned in fight, Had suddenly been snatched away, Calling out to her god in a clear, wild scream, 'Tis the Bird of our banner, the free bird that braves, When the battle is there, all the wrath of the waves: That dips her pinions in the sun's first gush; And sails around the skies, and o'er the rolling deeps, LESSON CLXXIV. Reply of Rob Roy Mac Gregor to Mr. Osbaldistone.-SCOTT. You speak like a boy-like a boy, who thinks the old gnarled oak can be twisted as easily as the young sapling. Can I forget that I have been branded as an outlaw, stigmatized as a traitor, a price set on my head as if I had been a wolf, my family treated as the dam and cubs of the hillfox, whom all may torment, vilify, degrade, and insult ;the very name which came to me from a long and noble line of martial ǎncestors, denounced, as if it were a spell to conjuret up the devil with ?— And they shall find that the name they have dared to proscribe-that the name of Mac Gregor is a spell to raise the wild devil withal. They shall hear of my vengeance, that would scorn to listen to the story of my wrongs.-The miserable Highland drover, bankrupt, barefooted, stripped of all, dishonored and hunted down, because the avarice of others grasped at more than that poor all could pay, shall burst on them in an awful chānge. They that scoffed at the grovelling worm, and trod upon him, may cry and how! when they see the stoop of the flying and fiery-mouthed dragon. But why do I speak of all this?-only ye may † Pron. kun'jar. *Pron. faw'kn opine it frets my patience to be hunted like an otter, or a seal, or a salmon upon the shallows, and that by my very friends and neighbors: and to have as many sword-cuts made, and pistols flashed at me, as I had this day in the ford of Avondow, would try a saint's temper, much more a Highlander's, who are not famous for that good gift, as you may have heard.-But one thing bides with me of what Nicol said. I'm vexed for the bairns-I'm vexed when I think of Robert and Hamish living their father's life-But let us say no more of this.— * * * * You must think hardly of us-and it is not natural that it should be otherwise. But remember, at least, we have not been unprovoked :-we are a rude and an ignorant, and it may be, a violent and passionate, but we are not a cruel people. The land might be at peace and in law, for us, did they allow us to enjoy the blessings of peaceful law. But we have been a persecuted people; and if persecution maketh wise men mad, what must it do to men like us, living as our fathers did a thousand years since, and possessing scarce more lights than they did? Can we view their bloody edicts against us-their hanging, heading, hounding, and hunting down an ancient and honorable name-as deserving better treatment than that which enemies give to enemies? Here I stand-have been in twenty frays, and never hurt man but when I was in hot blood!—and yet, they would betray me and hang me, like a masterless dog, at the gate of any great man that has an ill will at me. You are a kind-hearted and an honorable youth, and understand, doubtless, that which is due to the feelings of a man of honor.-But the heather that I have trod upon when living must bloom over me when I am dead-my heart would sink, and my arm would shrink and wither, like fern in the frost, were I to lose sight of my native hills; nor has the world a scene that would console me for the loss of the rocks and cairns, wild as they are, that you see around us. And Helen-what would become of her, were I to leave her, the subject of new insult and atrocity?—or how could she bear to be removed from these scenes where the remembrance of her wrongs is aye sweetened by the recollection of her revenge? I was once so hard put at by my great enemy, as I may well call him, that I was forced e'en to give way to the tide, and removed myself, and my people, and my family from our dwellings in our native land, and to withdraw for a time into Mac Cullum |