* made his way up the river which now bears his name, and through which he hoped to find the long-sought passage to the Indies. Slowly sailing up the river, and anchoring at night in the friendly harbors so plentifully scattered along his way, Hudson pursued his course toward the head of ship-navigation, admiring the ever-changing panorama of the beautiful river, with its lofty palisades, its broad bays, its picturesque bends, its romantic highlands, and its rocky shores covered with luxuriant forests. 6. Everywhere he was greeted with friendly reception. The river Indians, more gentle than those of the Island Manhattan, welcomed the strangers with offerings of the best the land afforded, and urged them to remain with them. Fancying that the white men were afraid of their arrows, the Indians broke them in pieces, and threw them into the fire. Game was killed for their use, hospitalities were urged upon them, and every attention which a rude but generous nature could prompt was offered to the strangers. Indeed, this seems in the beginning to have been the usual conduct of the natives; and it is probable that in their future hostilities, in nearly every instance, the whites were the aggressors. 7. On the 19th of September, Hudson reached the site of the present city of Albany, which, greatly to his disappointment, he found to be the head of navigation. To be sure of the fact, he dispatched the mate with a boat's crew to sound the river higher up; but after proceeding eight or nine leagues, finding but seven feet of water, they were forced to return with the unwelcome intelligence. After * In 1607, a company of English merchants fitted out a ship, and intrusted it to the command of Henry Hudson, with instructions to search for a passage through the Polar seas to China and Japan. In this, however, he was unsuccessful; and in 1609 he renewed the search in the service of the Dutch. remaining at anchor for several days, during which time he continued to hold friendly intercourse with the natives, Hudson prepared to descend the river. 8. His stay here was marked by a revel, the tradition of which is still preserved among the Indian legends, and the scene of which is laid by some historians upon the Island of Manhattan. Various legends of a similar import, concerning the introduction of the fatal "fire-water," are in existence among the different tribes of Indians: everywhere the same causes produced the same results, and the multiplicity of the traditions may be easily accounted for. 9. On the 23d of September, Hudson commenced to descend the river. He ascended in eleven days; he descended it in the same time, constantly receiving demonstrations of friendship from the natives of the neighboring shores. But unfortunately this harmony was soon destined to be broken. While anchored at Stony Point, an Indian was detected pilfering some goods through the cabin windows. The offender was instantly shot by the mate, and the frightened natives fled in consternation. 10. Nor was this the only rupture of peaceful relations with the hitherto friendly natives. Following the example of other discoverers, who were accustomed to carry to their own homes specimens of the natives of the new countries which they had visited, Hudson had seized and detained two Indians on board his ship at Sandy Hook, both of whom had escaped during his passage up the river, and were lying in wait for his return, to avenge their captivity. 11. Their narrative had enlisted the sympathies of their countrymen, and a large body gathered in their canoes at the head of Manhattan Island, and attempted to board the vessel. Repulsed in their attempt, they discharged a harm less flight of arrows at the yacht, which were returned by a musket-shot, which killed two of their number. They scattered in dismay only to gather again, re-enforced by several hundreds, at Fort Washington, where they again attacked the vessel as she was floating down the stream. A few musket-shots soon put them to flight, with the loss of nine of their warriors. 12. This strange, new weapon of the white men, speaking in tones of thunder, and belching forth fire and smoke, was more terrible to them than an army of invaders. They did not return to the attack, and Hudson pursued his way unmolested to the bay near Hoboken, where he anchored for the last time, and, lying windbound there for one day, set sail for Europe on the 4th of October, one month after his arrival, to carry to his patrons the news of the discovery of a new country, and the opening of a new commerce. LESSON CVIII. 1 PHIL' IP OF MACEDON, who was raised to the supremacy over all Greece, was born 383 B.C. Athens and Thebes had reached their highest vigor when Philip came to the throne. He soon possessed himself of Amphipolis, which gave him access to the gold-mines of Mount Pangæus ;· which became a source of immense revenue to him, and the reason of his founding the town of Philippi. He marched into Thessaly at the head of twenty thousand men. The terror of his name provoked the 'Philippics" of Demosthenes, who endeavored to rouse the people of Athens to form a general league against him; but they were cajoled or bribed by Philip into a shameful peace, and he marched into Greece, and was acknowledged the chief of the whole Hellenic world. He was murdered at the instigation of Olympias, while engaged at a religious festival, 336 years B.C. 2 FRANK' LIN. See note, page 145. GÄL VÄ'NI LUIGI, a distinguished physician and philologist, was born at Bologna, 1737; and died 1798. His name has become a household word from his great discovery of galvanism. The story, as told, is as follows:-The physician had been preparing some frog-soup for his sick wife, and some of these animals were lying stripped of their skins. An assistant had accidentally touched the crural nerve of one of the animals with the point of a scalpel, in the neighborhood of a conductor of an electrical machine, when the limbs were immediately thrown into convulsions. Galvani supposed that the cause of this was, as he called it," animal electricity;" but Volta and others corrected the error, and showed that it was due to chemical electricity, or Galvanism. CHOICE EXTRACTS. I. PERSONAL RELIGION. WEBSTER. POLITICAL eminence and professional fame fade away and die with all things earthly. Nothing of character is really permanent but virtue and personal worth. These remain. Whatever of excellence is wrought into the soul itself, belongs to both worlds. Real goodness does not attach itself merely to this life; it points to another world. Political or professional reputation can not last forever; but a conscience void of offense toward God and man is an inheritance for eternity. 2. Religion, therefore, is a necessary and indispensable element in any great human character. There is no living without it. Religion is the tie that connects man with his Creator, and holds him to His throne. If that tie be all sundered, all broken, he floats away, a worthless atom in the universe, its proper attractions all gone, its destiny thwarted, and its whole future nothing but darkness, desolation, and death. A man with no sense of religious duty is he whom the Scriptures describe, in such terse but terrific language, as living "without God in the world." Such a man is out of his proper being, — out of the circle of all his duties, and out of the circle of all his happiness, and away, far, far away, from the purposes of his creation. II. THE BEAM OF DEVOTION. GEORGE P. MORRIS. 1. I NEVER could find a good reason Why sorrow unbidden should stay, Our cares would wake no more emotion, That leave scarce a ripple behind. 2. The world has a spirit of beauty, To Providence leaves all the rest: Which lights us through life to its close, III. PROGRESS. Two principles govern the moral and intellectual world. One is perpetual progress, the other the necessary limitations to that progress. If the former alone prevailed, there would be nothing steadfast and durable on earth, and the whole of social life would be the sport of winds and waves. If the latter had exclusive sway, or even if it obtained a mischievous preponderancy, every thing |