And, as a strength were given him of God,
He rose up calmly, and composed the pall
Firmly and decently, and left him there,
As if his rest had been a breathing sleep.
The Miami Mounds.*-S. L. FAIRFIELD. 1. WRECKS of lost nations! monuments of deeds, Immortal once-but all forgotten now!
Mysterious ruins of a race unknown,
As proud of ancestry, and pomp, and fame-
Prouder, perchance, than those who porder here
O'er what their wild conjectures cannot solve!
Who raised these mouldering battlements? who trod
In jealous glory on these ruined walls?—
Who reigned, who triumphed, or who perished here?
What scenes of revelry, and mirth, and crime,
And love, and hate, and bliss, and bale, have passed?
Ah? none can tell.
Oblivion's dusky folds
Shroud all the past, and none may lift the pall;
Or, if they could, what would await the eye
Of antique research, but the fleshless forms
Of olden time: dark giant bones that tell—
Nothing! dim mysteries of the earth and air!
Since human passions met in conflict here,
The woods of centuries have grown-and oft
And long, the timid deer hath bounded o'er
The sepulchre of warriors, and wild birds
Sung notes of love o'er slaughter's crimson field,
And the gaunt wolf, and catamount, and fox,
Have made their couches in the embattled towers
Of dauntless chiefs, nor dreamt of danger there!
* In various parts of the Western States, numerous remains of fortifications, and mounds of earth, have been discovered, which have excited the astonishment and curiosity of all who have seen them. Some of these fortifications are small, while others enclose 40 or 50 acres of land. The mounds are built in the form of a sugar-loaf, and were undoubtedly used for burying places, as they are found to contain human bones. They must have been built at a very remote period, as trees several hundred years old are often seen growing upon them, and the present race of Indians have no tradition respecting their origin. They indicate great labor, and were evidently the work of a people who had made some advances in civilization, and who possessed considerable knowledge in the business of fortifications.
Princes and kings-the wise, the great, the good,
May slumber here, and blend their honored dust
With Freedom's soil; and navies may have rode
On the same wave that bears our starry sails.
3. Here heroes inay have bled to win a name
On Glory's sunbright scroll, and prophets watched
Their holy shrines, whose fires no longer glow.
Sweet rose and woodbine bowers around these walls
May once have bloomed, less fragrant and less fair
Than the fond hearts that blended, and the lips
That pressed in passion's rapture; and these airs,
That float unconscious by, may have been born
Of gales, that bore Love's soft enchanting words.
But all is silent now as Death's own halls!
4. Empires have perish'd where these forests tower In desolate array-and nations sunk,
With all their glories, to the darkling gulf
Of cold forgetfulness! But what avails
The uncertain guess, the dark and wildering search
For those whose spirits have but passed away
To the dark land of shadows and of dreams,
An hour before our own? Why in amaze
Behold these shattered walls, when other times
Shall hang in wondering marvel o'er our own
Proud cities, and enquire-" Who builded these?”
LESSON CLXXII.
On Time.-H. K. WHITE.
1 WHO needs a teacher to admonish him
That flesh is grass?-That earthly things are mist?
What are our joys but dreams? And what our hopes
But goodly shadows in the summer cloud?
There's not a wind that blows, but bears with it
Some rainbow promise.-Not a moment flies
But puts its sickle in the fields of life,
And mows its thousands, with their joys and cares.
2. "Tis but as yesterday, since on yon stars,
Which now I view, the Chaldee shepherd* gaz'd
In his mid-watch, observant, and dispos'd
The twinkling hosts, as fancy gave them shape.
Alluding to the first Astronomical observations, made by the Chaldean shepherds
Yet in the interim, what mighty shocks
Have buffetted mankind-whole nations razed—
Cities made desolate-the polished sunk
To barbarism, and once barbaric states
'Swaying the wand of science and of arts;
Illustrious deeds and memorable names
Blotted from record, and upon the tongue
Of grey tradition, voluble no more.
3. Where are the heroes of the ages past; Where the brave chieftains-where the mighty ones Who flourish'd in the infancy of days?—
All to the grave gone down!-On their fall'n fame
Exultant, mocking at the pride of man,
Sits grim Forgetfulness. The warrior's arm
Lies nerveless on the pillow of its shame;
Hush'd is his stormy voice, and quenched the blaze
Of his red eye-ball.
Yesterday his name
Was mighty on the earth-To-day-'tis what?
The meteor of the night of distant years,
That flash'd unnotic'd, save by wrinkled eld
Musing at midnight upon prophecies,
Who at her lonely lattice saw the gleam
Point to the mist-pois'd shroud, then quietly
Clos'd her pale lips, and lock'd the secret up
Safe in the charnel's treasures.
5.
O how weak
Is mortal man! How trifling-how confin'd
His scope of vision !-Puff'd with confidence,
His phrase grows big with immortality;
And he, poor insect of a summer's day,
Dreams of eternal honors to his name;
Of endless glory, and perennial bays.
He idly reasons of Eternity,
As of the train of ages,-when, alas!
Ten thousand thousand of his centuries
Are, in comparison, a little point,
Too trivial for account.-
"Tis passing strange, to mark his fallacies; Behold him proudly view some pompous pile, Whose high dome swells to emulate the skies, And smile and say, my name shall live with this, "Till Time shall be no more; while at his feet,
Yea, at his very feet, the crumbling dust
Of the fall'n fabric of the other day,
Preaches the solemn lesson.-He should know,
That time must conquer.
That the loudest blast
That ever fill'd Renown's obstrep'rous trump,
Fades in the lapse of ages, and expires.
Who lies inhum'd in the terrific gloom
Of the gigantic pyramid? Or who
Rear'd its huge wall?-Oblivion laughs and says,
The prey is mine. They sleep, and never more
Their names shall strike upon the ear of man,
Their mem'ry burst its fetters.
She lives but in the tale of other times;
Her proud pavilions are the hermits' home.
And her long colonnades, her public walks,
Now faintly echo to the pilgrim's feet,
Who comes to muse in solitude, and trace,
Through the rank moss reveal'd, her honored dust.
8. But not to Rome alone has fate confin'd
The doom of ruin; cities numberless,
Tyre, Sidon, Carthage, Babylon, and Troy,
And rich Phoenicia-they are blotted out,
Half-raz'd from memory; and their very name
And being in dispute !
LESSON CLXXIII.
Jugurtha in Prison.-REV. C. WOLFE.
1. WELL-is the rack prepared-the pincers heated? Where is the scourge?-How ?-not employed in Rome? Jugurtha was the son of Mastanabal and grand-son of the famous Massinissa, king of Numidia. His father having died while he was yet a child, he was taken by his uncle Micipsa and educated with his two sons, Hiemp sal and Adherbal. At the death of Micipsa, the kingdom of Numidia was divided equally between Jugurtha and his two cousins. Jugurtha, greatly in favor with the people, and ambitious to possess the kingdom alone, murdered Hiempsal, and sought to do the same by Adherbal, who fled to Rome for succor. The Roman senate, being highly bribed, not only declared Jugurtha innocent, but decreed him the sovereignty of half the kingdom. Soon after this, he besieged Adherbal in Cirta, the capital of the kingdom, took him, and cruelly put him to death. This drew on him the vengeance of the Romans. Being defeated several times by the army under the consul Marius, he applied to Bocchus, his father-in-law, king of Mauritania, for assistance, by whom he was betrayed into the hands of the Romans. He was led in chains to Rome to grace the triumph of Marius. The senate condemned him to be starved to death in a dungeon, where he died, B. C. 103
I'm sorry for it ;-I could enjoy it now;
I might have felt them yesterday; but now,-
Now, I have seen my funeral procession;
The chariot-wheels of Marius* have roll'd o'er me;
His horses' hoofs have trampled me in triumph;
I have attain'd that terrible consummation,
My soul could stand aloof, and from on high
Look down upon the ruins of my body
Smiling in apathy;-I feel no longer;
I challenge Rome to give another pang.
Oh! how he smiled, when he beheld me pause
Before his car, and scowl upon the mob;
The curse of Rome was burning on my lips,
And I had gnaw'd my chain, and hurl'd it at them
But that I knew he would have smiled again.
2. A king! and led before the gaudy Marius,
Before those shouting masters of the world,
As if I had been conquered: while each street,
Each peopled wall, and each insulting window,
Peal'd forth their brawling triumphs o'er my head
Oh! for a lion from thy woods, Numidia !-
Or had I, in that moment of disgrace,
Enjoy'd the freedom but of yonder slave,
I would have made my monument in Rome.
Yet I am not that fool, that Roman fool,
To think disgrace entombs the hero's soul,-
Forever damps his fires, and dims his glories;
That no bright laurel can adorn the brow
That once has bow'd; no victory's trumpet-sound
Can drown in joy the rattling of his chains.
3.
What avails it now,
That my proud views despised the narrow limits,
Which minds that span and measure out ambition
Had fixed to mine; and, while I seemed intent
On savage subjects and Numidian forests,
My soul had pass'd the bounds of Africa !-
* Caius Marius, a distinguished Roman general. He was seven times consul. Dissensions having arisen between him and Sylla, Marius and his party were defeated, and he was obliged to flee from Italy. After various disasters, he landed in Africa, and went in a melancholy manner and seated himself among the RUINS OF CARTHAGE. His party, headed by Cinna, gaining the ascendency, he returned to Rome, and put to death all whom he considered his enemies. Marius assumed the consulship, but died about one month after, ir a fit of debauch, aged 70-B. C. 86.
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