AMERICAN HISTORY.

THE HEROIC AGE.

EVERY nation, eminent for its civilization and the and attacks of their savage neighbors, were the obsta true greatness arising from it, has had its heroic age cles which the colonists were obliged to contend with, -an age to which the patriot turns with the greatest in addition to the great labor of levelling the dense forreverence, and learns from the volume of its history, est, constructing dwellings, tilling the soil and organiwritten or oral, the true causes of its first successful zing a civil government. But all of these were overprogress as a distinct empire, and the character of the come ;- the savages were reduced to submission, men to whom it is indebted for its existence and per- towns sprang up like magic in the wilderness, and petuity. The heroic age of a nation is that period the foundation for a mighty republic, now stretching when, in its weakest state as a colony, the people, led over half a continent, was laid deep and firm. To acon by some daring spirit, contend manfully against all complish all this, required the exercise of all the noobstacles and subdue every enemy which opposes bler faculties of the human soul. It required great their progress. It is that age when physical and moral and personal courage, the zeal of benevolent moral forces are opposed-when the national preju- patriotism of the most ardent nature, and the due exdices of aborigines and colonists must be assimilated ercise and control of all those passions and sentiments if not destroyed, and when the light of civilization which impart true greatness to the character of man. first essays to dispel barbarian darkness Assyria, This great work was accomplished-A new empire Egypt, Iran, Carthage, Greece, Etruria, Rome, and was formed-the people became a sovereignty, indeBritain, have all had their heroic ages; and last in the catalogue is our own Republic.

Although two hundred years have not yet elapsed since the first English colony took permanent root in America, and planted that seed of civil and religious liberty which has now grown up such a noble and wide-spreading tree, yet the events of those two centuries are characterized by loftier patriotism, nobler heroism and more enduring good to mankind, present and future, than ever distinguished Rome during the thousand years from the era of Tullius, to her rapid decline.

pendent of all other nations-took their oath of allegiance to a newly formed constitution-and, with this crowning act, ended the heroic age of America.

On the tenth day of April, 1607, three small ships, of which the largest did not exceed a hundred tons burden, entered Chesapeake bay, freighted with one hundred and five men, a small stock of provisions, and a few arms and ammunition. For four months they had been buffeting the waves of the Atlantic, and for three days previous to the time in question, they had battled with a furious storm in vain attempts to land at Roanoke, where Raleigh had three times planWe behold with admiration the struggles of infant ted a colony, but with disastrous consequences. This Carthage;—but what were they, compared to those little company of adventurers had left the endearments of the weak colonies of America? We sympathise of home, and the advantages of social life, then so with the Moors, when, on reading the history of the great in England, to build up an empire in the new past, we see them disputing, inch by inch, the soil of world. Others had preceded them with the same Granada with the barbarians, and successfully introdu- intentions, and the hope of individual gain; but the eing civilization and refinement into western Europe; weapons of the Indian, sickness, and disappointment, but their warfare was more equal and their resources had either destroyed them or driven them back to far greater, than were the Pilgrim fathers and their contemporaries. The former were nerved for physical strife, and had powerful allies near; they were disciplined in the arts of war, and entered upon the great task of building up a new empire, with the united strength of thousands concentrated to one point. Not the Powhatan river. so the English colonists in America. They came few The morning was bright and balmy when the in number, and those few were separated from the little fleet of Newport anchored off a promontory, civilized world by three thousand miles of ocean. which, in honor of the prince of Wales, he called They came almost unarmed, and reared their standard Cape Henry. The land breeze was freighted in a wilderness filled with barbarous tribes, exaspera- with the rich perfumes of early spring flowers, ted by acts of former transient settlers, and jealous of and from the forests which fringed the shores of the encroachments of those they deemed intruders. the bay, the melody of thousands of song-birds Famine, sickness, dissensions, and the conspiracies formed a striking contrast to the tempest which

England, and, for a period of one hundred and ten years from the time when the shores of Virginia were discovered by Cabot, no permanent settlement had been effected till this little colony, under the command of Captain Newport, landed at the mouth of