8. Harmonious in their action, the air and sea are obedient to law, and subject to order in all their movements. When we consult them in the performance of their manifold and marvelous offices, they teach us lessons concerning the wonders of the deep, the mysteries of the sky, and the greatness, wisdom, and goodness of the Creator. The investigations into the broad-spreading circle of phenomena connected with the winds of heaven, and the waves of the sea, are second to none for the good which they do, and for the lessons which they teach. The astronomer is said to see the hand of God in the sky; but does not the rightminded mariner, who looks aloft as he ponders over these things, hear His voice in every wave of the sea that "claps its hands," and feel His presence in every breeze that blows'? LESSON CXLIV. 1GENI I, good or evil spirits, supposed by the ancients to preside over 1. I man's destiny in life. THE CLOUD. SHELLEY. BRING fresh showers for the thirsting flowers, I bear light shade for the leaves when laid In their noon-day dreams; From my wings are shaken the dews that waken When rocked to rest on their mother's breast, I wield the flail of the lashing hail, And whiten the green plains under; And then again I dissolve it in rain, And laugh as I pass in thunder. 2. I sift the snow on the mountains below, And their great pines groan aghast ; And all the night 'tis my pillow white, While I sleep in the arms of the blast. In a cavern under is fettered the thunder, - Over earth and ocean, with gentle motion, Lured by the love of the genii1 that move Over the rills, and the crags, and the hills, Wherever he dream, under mountain or stream, And I, all the while, bask in heaven's blue smile, 3. The sanguine sunrise, with his meteor eyes, And his burning plumes outspread, Leaps on the back of my sailing rack, When the morning-star shines dead, As on the jag of a mountain-crag, Which an earthquake rocks and swings, An eagle, alit, one moment may sit, In the light of its golden wings. And when sunset may breathe, from the lit sea beneath, Its ardors of rest and love, And the crimson pall of eve may fall From the depth of heaven above, With wings folded I rest, on mine airy nest, As still as a brooding dove. 4. That orbed Maiden, with white fire laden, Glides glimmering o'er my fleece-like floor, And wherever the beat of her unseen feet, May have broken the woof of my tent's thin roof, And I laugh to see them whirl and flee, When I widen the rent in my wind-built tent, Like strips of the sky fallen through me on high, 5. I bind the sun's throne with a burning zone, The volcanoes are dim, and the stars reel and swim, Sun-beam proof, I hang like a roof, The mountains its columns be. The triumphal arch through which I march When the powers of the air are chained to my chair, The sphere-fire above its soft colors wove, 6. I am the daughter of earth and water, I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores; For after the rain, when, with never a stain, The pavilion of heaven is bare, And the winds and sunbeams, with their convex gleams, Build up the blue dome of air, I silently laugh at my own cenotaph, And out of the caverns of rain, Like a sprite from the gloom, like a ghost from the tomb, I rise and upbuild it again. LESSON CXLV. 1 A CROP O LIS, the upper or higher part of a Grecian city; hence the citadel or castle, and especially the citadel of Athens. EULOGY ON DANIEL WEBSTER.* LEWIS GAYLORD CLARK. ПHE voice of national eulogy and sorrow unite to tell us, Daniel Webster is numbered with the dead. Seldom has mortality seen a sublimer close of an illustrious career. No American, since Washington, has, to so great an extent, occupied the thoughts, and molded the minds, of men. The past may hold back its tribute, and the present give no light; but the future will show, in colors of living truth, the honor which is justly due him as the political prophet, and great intellectual light of the New World. His life-time labors have been to defend the Constitution, to preserve the Union, to honor the great men of the Revolution, to vindicate international law, to develop the resources of the country, and transmit the blessings of good *Daniel Webster died at Marshfield, Mass., Oct. 24, 1852, in the seventyfirst year of his age. government to all who should thereafter walk on American soil. 2. Death has thrown a deep and somber pall over the land. Tearful is Columbia's eye, and desolate is her heart. Her temple is shrouded in gloom; its aisles are thronged with mourners; its columns are wreathed with cypress. The muffled bell is but the echo of the muffled heart. Elegy has stifled encomium; panegyric has yielded to sorrow; grief has become the most befitting eulogy. It is right that mourning should shroud the land. A star of magnitude and luster has left the horizon, and gone down to the realms of death. 3. Wherever on earth patriotism commands regard, and eloquence leads captive the soul, it will be seen and felt that a truly great man has been called away, and left a void. which none can fill. New Hampshire has lost her noblest column. She has no more such granite left. Massachusetts will not soon cease weeping for her adopted son. Plymouth Rock, Faneuil Hall, and Bunker Hill, will forever speak of him whose eloquence has made them hallowed spots in the remembrance of mankind. 4. Daniel Webster was great in all the elements of his character. Great in original mental strength; great in varied and vast acquirements; great in quick and keen perception; great in subtle, logical discrimination; great in force of thought; great in power of intense and rigid analysis; great in rare and beautiful combination of talent; great in ability to make an effort, and command his power; great in range and acuteness of vision, he could see like a prophet. Hence his decision of character; his bold, manly, and independent thought; his whole sovereignty of mind. No man, probably, ever lived, who could calculate with such mathematical certainty the separate |