EAST AND WEST.

CHAPTER I.

THE NEW ENGLAND COTTAGE.

"There is a land of beauty bright,
The clime of love, the home of light,
With gems and fragrant lilies dight."

Ir the reader is a stranger to the
New England village and its pictur-
esque scenery, it will be a difficult
task to strengthen the mental eye,
though aided by a vivid imagination,
to look upon its lofty mountains,
clothed with the richest verdure, which

have nursed the gigantic oak and towering pine, amid whose branches the forked lightnings have held their midnight dance, while the deep-toned thunder strove in vain to chant the requiem of centuries past; and against whose impregnable sides the frenzied whirlwinds have dashed in quick suecession the electric balls, unextinguished by the rolling torrents falling from cleft to cleft, until the shattered crag loses its strong hold, and the unimpeded element finds a safe deposit. in the bosom of some deep ravine, where it leaves its maddened roar, and mingles with the purling stream or babbling brook. There is beauty, as well as sublimity, mingled with mountain scenery. The eye cannot rest with indifference upon the distant cast, while the King of day raises his golden lid, and with his irradiating lashes forming the glorious network