stifled in rejoicing. To make a monarch, there must be slaves; and that one may triumph, many must be weak.

The dignity and the destiny of man seem utterly at variance. He turns from contemplating a monument of genius to inquire for the genius which produced it, and finds that while the work has survived, the workman has perished for ages. The meanest work of man outlives the noblest work of God. The sculptures of Phidias endure, where the dust of the artist has vanished from the earth. Man can immortalize all things but himself.

But, for my own part, I can not help thinking that our high estimation of ourselves is the grand error in our account. Surely, it is argued, a creature so ingeniously fashioned and so bountifully furnished, has not been created but for lofty ends. But cast your eye on the humblest rose of the garden, and it may teach a wiser lesson. There you behold contrivance and ornament-in every leaf, the finest veins, the most delicate odor, and a perfume exquisite beyond imitation; yet all this is but a toy-a plaything of nature; and surely she whose resources are so boundless that upon the gaud of a summer day she can throw away such lavish wealth, steps not beyond her commonest toil when she forms of the dust a living man. When will man learn the lesson of his own insignificance ?

Immortal man! thy blood flows freely and fully, and thou standest a Napoleon; thou reclinest a Shakspeare!-it quickens its movement, and thou liest a parched and fretful thing, with thy mind furied by the phantoms of fever!-it retards its action but a little,

and thou crawlest a crouching, soulless mass, the bright world a blank, dead vision to thine eye. Verily, O man, thou art a glorious and godlike being!

Tell life's proudest tale: what is it? A few attempts successless; a few crushed or moldered hopes; much paltry fretting; a little sleep, and the story is concluded; the curtain falls-the farce is over. The world is not a place to live in, but to die in. It is a house that has but two chambers; a lazar and a charnel-room only for the dying and the dead. There is not a spot on the broad earth on which man can plant his foot and affirm with confidence, "No mortal sleeps beneath!"

Seeing then that these things are, what shall we say? Shall we exclaim with the gay-hearted Grecian, "Drink to-day, for to-morrow we are not?" Shall we calmly float down the current, smiling if we can, silent when we must, lulling cares to sleep by the music of gentle enjoyment, and passing dream-like through a land of dreams? No! dream-like as is our life, there is in it one reality-our DUTY. Let us cling to that, and distress may overwhelm, but can not disturb us may destroy, but can not hurt us: the bitterness of earthly things and the shortness of earthly life will cease to be evils, and begin to be blessings.

HOW "RUBY" PLAYED.

Jud Brownin, when visiting New York, goes to hear Rubinstein, and gives the following description of his playing:

Well, sir, he had the blamedest, biggest, cattycornedest pianner you ever laid eyes on; somethin' like a distracted billiard table on three legs. The lid was hoisted, and mighty well it was. If it hadn't been, he'd a tore the entire inside clean out, and scattered 'em to the four winds of heaven.

me.

Flayed well? You bet he did; but don't interrupt

When he first sit down, he 'peared to keer mighty little 'bout playin', and wisht he hadn't come. He tweedle-leed'ed a little on the treble, and twoodleoodled some on the base—just foolin' and boxin' the things jaws for bein' in his way. And I says to a man setten' next to me, says I: "What sort of fool playin' is that?" And he says, "Heish!" But presently his hands commenced chasin' one another up and down the keys, like a passel of rats scamperin' through a garret very swift. Parts of it was sweet, though, and reminded me of a sugar squirrel turnin' the wheel of a candy cage.

"Now," I says to my neighbor, "he's showin' off. He thinks he's a-doin' of it, but he ain't got no idee, no plan of nothin.' If he'd play me a tune of some

kind or other I'd-"

But my neighbor says "Heish!" very impatient. I was just about to git up and go home, bein' tired of that foolishness, when I heard a little bird waking up away off in the woods, and call sleepy-like to his mate, and I looked up and see that Rubin was beginning to take some interest in his business, and I sit down again. It was the peep of day. The light came faint from the east, the breezes blowed gentle and fresh, some more birds waked up in the orchard, then some more in the trees near the house, and all begun singin' together. People began to stir, and the gal opened the shutters. Just then the first beam of the sun fell upon the blossoms a little more, and it techt the roses on the bushes, and the next thing it was broad day, the sun fairly blazed, the birds sung like they'd split their little throats; all the leaves was movin', and flashin' diamonds of dew, and the whole

wide world was bright and happy as a king. Seemed to me like there was a good breakfast in every house in the land, and not a sick child or woman anywhere. It was a fine mo:..in'.

is."

And I says to my neighbor: "That's music, that

But he glared at me like he'd like to cut my throat.

Presently the wind turned; it begun to thicken up, and a kind of gray mist came over things; I got low-spirited directly. Then a silver rain begun to fall. I could see the drops touch the ground; some flashed up like long pearl ear-rings, and the rest rolled away like round rubies. It was pretty but melancholy. Then the pearls gathered themselves into long strands and necklaces, and then they melted into thin silver streams, running between golden gravels, and then the streams joined each other at the bottom of the hill, and made a brook that flowed silent, except that you could kinder see the music, 'specially when the bushes on the banks moved as the music went along down the valley. I could smell the flowers in the meadow.

The most curious thing was the little white angelboy, like you see in pictures, that run ahead of the music brook and led it on and on, away out of the world, where no man ever was, certain. I could see that boy just as plain as I see you. Then the moonlight came, without any sunset, and shone on the graveyards, where some few ghosts lifted their hands and went over the wall, and between the black, sharptop trees splendid marble houses rose up, with fine ladies in the lit-up windows, and men that loved 'em,

but could never get a-nigh 'em, who played on guitars under the trees, and made me that miserable I could have cried, because I wanted to love somebody, I don't know who, better than the men with the guitars did. Then the sun went down, it got dark, the wind moaned and wept like a lost child for its dead mother, and I could a got up then and there and preached a better sermon than any I ever listened to. There wasn't a thing in the world left to live for, not a blame thing, and yet I didn't want the music to stop one bit. It was happier to be miserable than to be happy without being miserable. I couldn't understand it. I hung my head and pulled out my handkerchief, and blowed my nose loud to keep me from cryin'. My eyes is weak anyway; I didn't want anybody to be a-gazin' at me a-snivlin', and it's nobody's business what I do with my nose, It's mine. But some several glared at me mad as blazes. Then, all of a

He ripped out

sudden, old Rubin changed his tune. and he rared, he tipped and he tared, he pranced and he charged like the grand entry at a circus. 'Peared to me that all the gas in the house was turned on at once, things got so bright, and I hilt up my head, ready to look any man in the face, and not afraid of nothin'. It was a circus, and a brass band, and a big ball all goin' on at the same time. He lit into them keys like a thousand of brick; he give 'em no rest day or night; he set every livin' joint in me a-goin' and not bein' able to stand it no longer, I jumped spang onto my seat, and jest hollered:

"Go it, my Rube!"

Every blamed man, woman, and child in the house riz on me, and shouted, "Put him out!" "Put him out!"