ately. Then you come down again with celerity, and get over the fence as if you were in earnest. Going home in the train all the passengers regard you, from your appearance, as an escaped convict, or a lunatic who has broken from his keepers; and when you reach your home you plunge into a shirt, cover your hands with a court-plaster, and register a solemn vow never to go on another picnic. And we are with you; we never will either.

THE STIGMA.-F. DE HAES JANVIER.

It is related that, some forty years ago, John C. Calhoun, a Senator of the United States, from the State of South Carolina, and at that time employed in perfecting the great Nullification Scheme of which he was the author, was, one night, at a late hour, scated in his room, and engaged in writing, when, falling asleep, he had a dream, the incidents of which are here woven into verse.

In a chamber, grand and gloomy, in the shadow of the night, Two wax tapers flaming faintly, burned with a sepulchral light,

On an oval oaken table, from their silver stands they shone, Where about them in disorder, books and manuscripts were strown;

Where before them sat a statesman, silent, thoughtful and alone!

Suddenly a stranger entered-entered with a serious air, And with steady step advancing, near the table drew a chair! Folded in an ample mantle, carefully concealed from sight, There he sat, and his companion watched him, through the wavering light,

Wondering at his bold intrusion, unannounced, and in the night.

Wondering at his staid demeanor, wondering that no word he spoke,

Wondering that he veiled his visage in the volume of his cloak

Till, as though unwilling longer, satisfaction to postpone, "Senator from Carolina," said he in a solemn tone,

"What are you engaged in writing, here at midnight and alone?"

Then the statesman answered promptly, ""Tis a plan which consummates,

When complete, the dissolution of the Union of the States.

Whereupon, rejoined the stranger, in an accent of command, "Senator from Carolina, let me look at your right hand!" And the statesman had no power that calm dictate to withstand!

Slowly then uprose the stranger, and the startled statesman saw,

From the falling cloak emerging, one from whom he shrunk with awe!

Stern and stately stood before him Freedom's first and favorite son

He whose patriotic valor universal homage won—

He who gave the world the Union-the immortal WASHINGTON!

And he thrilled with strange emotion, in the patriot's steadfast gaze,

As he held the hand he proffered, held it near the taper's blaze,

As he thoughtfully proceeded, "Then you would, with this right hand,

Senator from Carolina, desolate your native land,

You would sign a Declaration, this fair Union to disband?”

And the Senator responded: "Yes, should chance such service claim,

To an Act of Dissolution I would freely sign my name." But the words were scarcely spoken, when amazed he saw expand,

Dim at first, then deeper, darker, an unsightly, blackened brand,

Like a loathsome, leprous plague-spot, on the back of his right hand!

"What is that?" he cried with horror as the dreadful stigma spread

And the Patriot's grasp relaxing, undisturbed, he gravely said:

"That black blotch your hand o'erspreading is the mark by which they know

One who, honored by his country, basely sought its overthrow

That detested traitor, Arnold, in the dismal world below!”

Pausing then, he from his mantle drew an object toward the light,

Placed it on the oaken table, in the shuddering statesman's sight

Placed it on the very writing which that traitorous hand had done;

Still, and stark, and grim, and ghastly, 'twas a human skeleton! There it lay, and then he added calmly as he had begun :

"Here, behold the sacred relics of a man who, long ago, Died at Charleston, on a gibbet, murdered by a ruthless foe,Isaac Hayne, who fell a martyr, laying down his life with joy, To confirm this noble Union, which you wantonly employ Powers, for virtuous ends intended, treacherously to destroy! "When you sign a solemn compact, this blest bond to disunite, Lying here upon your table you should have his bones in sight.

He was born in Carolina,-so were you,--but, all in vain Will you look for Treason's stigma-will you seek the slightest stain

On the hand of that pure patriot, the right hand of Isaac Hayne!"

Saying this, the stranger vanished, but the skeleton remained,

And the black and blasting stigma still that traitorous hand retained!

Sinking in their silver sockets, fainter still the tapers gleamed; Suddenly, athwart the chamber, morning's rosy radiance streamed,

And the statesman, wan and weary, wondering, woke-for he had dreamed.

HEARTBREAK HILL.-CELIA THAXTER,

In Ipswich town, not far from sea,
Rises a hill which the people call
Heartbreak Hill, and its history

Is an old, old legend, known to all.
The selfsame dreary, worn-out tale
Told by all peoples in every clime,
Still to be told till the ages fail,

And there comes a pause in the march of time.

It was a sailor who won the heart

Of an Indian maiden, lithe and young;

And she saw him over the sea depart,

While sweet in her ear the promise rung;

For he cried, as he kissed her wet eyes dry,
"I'll come back, sweetheart, keep your faith!"
She said, “I will watch while the moons go by."-
Her love was stronger than life or death.

So this poor dusk Ariadne kept

Her watch from the hill-top rugged and steep:
Slowly the empty moments crept

While she studied the changing face of the deep,

Fastening her eyes upon every speck

That crossed the ocean within her ken:-
Might not her lover be walking the deck,
Surely and swiftly returning again?

The Isles of Shoals loomed, lonely and dim,
In the northeast distance far and gray,
And on the horizon's uttermost rim

The low rock-heap of Boon Island lay.

And north and south and west and east
Stretched sea and land in the blinding light,
Till evening fell, and her vigil ceased,
And many a hearth-glow lit the night,

To mock those set and glittering eyes
Fast growing wild as her hope went out;
Hateful seemed earth, and the hollow skies,
Like her own heart, empty of aught but doubt.

Oh, but the weary, merciless days,

With the sun above, with the sea afar,No change in her fixed and wistful gaze

From the morning red to the evening star!

Oh, the winds that blew, and the birds that sang, The calms that smiled, and the storms that rolled, The bells from the town beneath, that rang

Through the summer's heat and the winter's cold!
The flash of the plunging surges white,
The soaring gull's wild, boding cry,—

She was weary of all; there was no delight
In heaven or earth, and she longed to die.

What was it to her though the dawn should paint
With delicate beauty skies and seas?
But the swift, sad sunset splendors faint
Made her soul sick with memories,

Drowning in sorrowful purple a sail

In the distant east, where shadows grew,
Till the twilight shrouded it cold and pale,
And the tide of her anguish rose anew.
Like a slender statue carved of stone

She sat, with hardly motion or breath,
She wept no tears and she made no moan,
But her love was stronger than life or death.

He never came back! Yet faithful still,

She watched from the hill-top her life away: And the townsfolk christened it Heartbreak Hill, And it bears the name to this very day.

SUMNER'S TRIBUTE TO WILLIAM PENN.

To William Penn belongs the distinction, destined to brighten as men advance in virtue, of first in human history establishing the Law of Love as a rule of conduct for the intercourse of nations. While he recognized as a great end of government, "to support power in reverence with the people, and to secure the people from abuse of power," he declined the superfluous protection of arms against foreign force, and aimed to reduce the savage nations by just and gentle manners to the love of civil society and the Christian religion. His serene countenance, as he stands with his followers in what he called the sweet and clear air of Pennsylvania, all unarmed, beneath the spreading elm, forming the great treaty of friendship with the untutored Indians, who fill with savage display the surrounding forest as far as the eye can reach,-not to wrest their lands by violence, but to obtain them by peaceful purchase,—is to my mind, the proudest picture in the history of our country.

"The great God,” said this illustrious Quaker, in his words of sincerity and truth, addressed to the sachems, "has written his law in our hearts, by which we are taught and commanded to love, and to help, and to do good to one another. It is not our custom to use hostile weapons against our fellow creatures, for which reason we have come unarmed. Our object is not to do injury, but to do good. We have met, then, in the broad pathway of good faith and good will, so that no advantage can be taken on either side, but all is to be openness, brotherhood, and love; while all are to be treated as of the same flesh and blood."

These are, indeed, words of true greatness. "Without any carnal weapons," says one of his companions, "we entered the land, and inhabited therein as safe as if there had been thousands of garrisons." This little State," says Oldmixon, "subsisted in the midst of six Indian nations, without so much as a militia for its defense." A great man, worthy of the mantle of Penn, the venerable philanthropist, Clarkson, in his life of the founder of Pennsylvania, says, “The Pennsylvanians became armed, though without arms; they be