The Classic and the Beautiful from the Literature of Three Thousand Years

PALEMON AND LAVINIA.

AVINIA once had friends,
And Fortune smiled deceit-
ful on her birth;
For in her helpless years

deprived of all,

Of every stay, save inno

A native grace

Of evening, shone in tears.
Sat fair-proportioned on her polished limbs.
Veiled in a simple robe, their best attire,
Beyond the pomp of dress; for loveliness
Needs not the foreign aid of ornament,
But is, when unadorned, adorned the most;
Thoughtless of beauty, she was Beauty's self,
Recluse amid the close-embowering woods.
As in the hollow breast of Apennine,
Beneath the shelter of encircling hills,
A myrtle rises, far from human eye,
Among the windings of a And breathes its balmy fragrance o'er the

cence and Heaven,

She with her widowed moth-
er-feeble, old

And poor-lived in a cottage
far retired

woody vale,

By solitude and deep-surrounding shades,
But more by bashful modesty, concealed.
Together thus they shunned the cruel scorn
Which virtue sunk to poverty would meet
From giddy passion and low-minded pride,
Almost on Nature's common bounty fed,
Like the gay birds that
them to repose
sung
Content and careless of to-morrow's fare.

Her form was fresher than the morning rose
When the dew wets its leaves, unstained and

pure

As is the lily or the mountain snow.
The modest virtues mingled in her eyes,
Still on the ground dejected, darting all
Their humid beams into the blooming
flowers;

Or when the mournful tale her mother told
Of what her faithless fortune promised once
Thrilled in her thought, they, like the dewy

star

wild,

So flourished blooming and unseen by all
The sweet Lavinia, till, at length, compelled
By strong Necessity's supreme command,
With smiling patience in her looks she went
To glean Palemon's fields.

The pride of swains
Palemon was, the generous and the rich,
Who led the rural life in all its joy
And elegance, such as Arcadian song
Transmits from ancient uncorrupted times,
When tyrant Custom had not shackled man,
But free to follow Nature was the mode.
He, then, his fancy with autumnal scene
Amusing, chanced beside his reaper-train
To walk, when poor Lavinia drew his eye,
Unconscious of her power, and, turning quick
With unaffected blushes from his gaze,
He saw her charming, but he saw not half
The charms her downcast modesty concealed.
That very moment love and chaste desire

Sprung in his bosom, to himself unknown; For still the world prevailed, and its dread laugh,

Which scarce the firm philosopher can scorn, Should his heart own a gleaner in the field, And thus in secret to his soul he sighed :

What pity that so delicate a form,

By beauty kindled, where enlivening sense And more than vulgar goodness seems to dwell,

Should be devoted to the rude embrace

Of some indecent clown! She looks, methink,

Of old Acasto's line, and to my mind
Recalls that patron of my happy life,
From whom my liberal fortune took its rise,
Now to the dust gone down, his houses, lands
And once fair-spreading family dissolved.
'Tis said that in some lone obscure retreat,
Urged by remembrance sad and decent pride,
Far from those scenes which knew their bet-
ter days,

His aged widow and his daughter live, Whom yet my fruitless search could never find.

Her rising beauties flushed a higher bloom, And thus Palemon, passionate and just, Poured out the pious rapture of his soul:

'And art thou, then, Acasto's dear remains― She whom my restless gratitude has sought So long in vain? O heavens! the very

same

The softened image of my noble friend
Alive, his every look, his every feature,
More elegantly touched. Sweeter than spring,
Thou sole surviving blossom from the root
That nourished up my fortune, say, ah where,
In what sequestered desert, hast thou drawn
The kindest aspect of delighted Heaven,
Into such beauty spread and blown so fair,
Though poverty's cold wind and crushing

rain

years?

Beat keen and heavy on thy tender
Oh, let me now into a richer soil
Transplant thee safe, where vernal suns and
showers

Diffuse their warmest, largest influence,
And of my garden be the pride and joy!
Ill it befits thee, oh it ill befits
Acasto's daughter-his whose open stores,

Romantic wish! would this the daughter Though vast, were little to his ampler were!"

When, strict inquiring, from herself he found
She was the same, the daughter of his friend,
Of bountiful Acasto, who can speak
The mingled passions that surprised his heart
And through his nerves in shivering trans-
port ran?

Then blazed his smothered flame, avowed and bold;

And as he viewed her, ardent, o'er and o'er, Love, gratitude and pity wept at once. Confused and frightened at his sudden tears,

heart,

The father of a country-thus to pick
The very refuse of those harvest-fields
Which from his bounteous friendship I enjoy.
Then throw that shameful pittance from thy
hand,

But ill-applied to such a rugged task;
The fields, the master-all, my fair-are

thine

If to the various blessings which thy house Has on me lavished thou wilt add that bliss, That dearest bliss, the power of blessing thee !"

Here ceased the youth; yet still his speak- | For rhetoric, he could not ope

ing eye
Expressed the sacred triumph of his soul,
With conscious virtue, gratitude and love
Above the vulgar joy divinely raised.
Nor waited he reply. Won by the charm
Of goodness irresistible, and all

In sweet disorder lost, she blushed consent.
The news immediate to her mother brought
While pierced with anxious thought she pined
away

The lonely moments for Lavinia's fate,
Amazed, and scarce believing what she heard,
Joy seized her withered veins, and one bright
gleam

Of setting life shone on her evening hours,
Not less enraptured than the happy pair,
Who flourished long in tender bliss and reared
A numerous offspring lovely like themselves,
And good, the grace of all the country round.

JAMES THOMSON.

HUDIBRAS'S LOGIC.

E was in logic a great critic,
Profoundly skilled in analytic;
He could distinguish and divide

A hair 'twixt south and south-west side,
On either which he would dispute,
Confute, change hands, and still confute;
He'd undertake to prove by force
Of argument a man's no horse;
He'd prove a buzzard is no fowl,
And that a lord may be an owl,
A calf an alderman, a goose a justice,
And rooks committee-men and trustees;
He'd run in debt by disputation,
And pay with ratiocination :
All this by syllogism true

In mood and figure he would do.

His mouth but out there flew a trope;
And when he happened to break off
I' th' middle of his speech or cough,
H' had hard words ready to show why,
And tell what rules he did it by;
Else, when with greatest art he spoke,
You'd think he talked like other folk;
For all a rhetorician's rules
Teach nothing but to name his tools.

But when he pleased to show't, his speech
In loftiness of sound was rich—
A Babylonish dialect

Which learned pedants much affect:
It was a party-colored dress
Of patched and piebald languages;
'Twas English cut on Greek and Latin,
Like fustian heretofore on satin;
It had an odd promiscuous tone,
As if he had talked three parts in one,
Which made some think, when he did gabble
Th' had heard three laborers of Babel,
Or Cerberus himself, pronounce
A leash of languages at once.
This he as volubly would vent
As if his stock would ne'er be spent;
And truly, to support that charge,
He had supplies as vast and large,
For he could coin or counterfeit
New words with little or no wit-
Words so debased and hard no stone
Was hard enough to touch them on;
And when with hasty noise he spoke 'em,
The ignorant for current took 'em;
That had the orator who once
Did fill his mouth with pebble-stones
When he harangued but known his phrase,
He would have used no other ways.

SAMUEL BUTLER,

THE WELL-BRED MAN.

FROM THE GERMAN OF GOETHE.

WELL-BRED carriage is difficult to imitate; for in strictness it is negative, and it implies a long-continued previous training. You are not required to exhibit in your manner anything that betokens dignity, for by this means you are like to run into formality and haughtiness you are rather to avoid whatever is undignified and vulgar. You are never to forget yourself, are to keep a constant watch upon yourself and others, to forgive nothing that is faulty in your own conduct, in that of others neither to forgive too little nor too much. Nothing must appear to touch you, nothing to agitate; you must never overhurry your self, must ever keep yourself composed, retaining still an outward calmness whatever storms may rage within. The noble character at certain moments may resign himself to his emotions; the well-bred man,

It is clear, then, that to seem well-bred a man must actually be so. It is also clear why women are generally more expert at taking up the air of breeding than the other sex, why courtiers and soldiers catch it more easily than other men.

Translation of JOHN STUART BLACKIE.

THE ROMANCE OF INSECT-LIFE. HE earth teems with mysteries. The

THE

sky shines with them; they float in the air; they swim in the deep; they flash from the dark-robed clouds; they whisper in the gentle tones of the summer wind; they speak in trumpet-tongues in the voice of the tempest and the thunder.

Cease thy longings for the ancient days, O dreamer! Close thy book and look about thee upon the volume of Nature. See! there before thee is a tiny insect that thou canst scarce distinguish from the grains of sand that surround it. Watch it. It moves on with an energy and an instinct that enable it to overcome or avoid all obstacles. See! it has seized some object larger than itself, and still it goes bravely on. Nothing daunts it; nothing stops it. Tread it under foot, if thou canst have the heart to attempt such a murder, and it will rise up again beneath the ocean of sand and turn once more. to its labor. Dost thou know it? It is the ant-the lion-hearted ant-toiling amid the heat of summer; and, though the season's brightness and its warmth are bringing up

and producing ten thousand enjoyments for the little traveller, he is busy gathering together his provender for the long wintertime, when frost and snow and cold shall have locked up the granaries of Nature. Thou wilt tell me that I am mocking thee -that thou canst see this daily and hourly, and is this a mystery, therefore? If thou hadst read in those ancient legends before thee of an insect so courageous that it would attack an animal of ten thousand times its magnitude, of industry so indefatigable that it would climb housetops and mountains to pursue its course, of perseverance so unflagging that though repulsed a thousand times it still would return and overcome the obstacle that impeded it, the eye would have sparkled with interest and amazement. It is because it is constantly before thee, because it belongs to the present time, that thou lookest so disdainfully upon it. When did the knight-errants of thy heart do half so much? When did their bosoms beat as high with valor and determination as this poor insect? "But it has no loves, no burning jealousies,

no blood-stained victories !"

How knowest thou that? I warrant thee even that tiny breast has grown gentle for some fond one that lived within its little world; that its blood has moved quicker when some Adonis-ant has flitted around the little coquette; that its path has been stained by the trophies of its mimic battles. But thou wilt say, "Why dost thou lure me from my glowing page to point me to this moving atom? Why not show me the majestic mysteries of Nature? Why waste my aim with a topic so insignificant?" I answer, "Because it is insignificant. I

point thee there, to one of the smallest of earth's creatures, to ask thee, If the atoms contain such wonders, how much more the noble and lofty works of Nature?"

Follow me, if thou wilt. Let us dive into the caverns of the earth and mark the sculptured halls, the rocky avenues stretching miles and miles below the busy haunts of men. Let us plunge into the deep and see the huge leviathan sporting amid the waters, or the rainbow-hued dolphin as it flings back bright rays of the glorious sun. Let us climb into the air and behold the eagle with his untiring wing and his unflinching eye, the noble image of indomitable perseverance and of brilliant genius, soaring proudly and gazing fixedly toward heaven's brightest luminary. O dreamer, if the moments of thy life were multiplied by the sands of the desert, they would be all too short to unravel these mysteries that are around thee and above thee.

JUDGE CHARLTON.

MUSIC AT MRS. PONTO'S.

THE jingling of a harp and piano announced that Mrs. Ponto's ung pu de Musick had commenced, and the smell of the stable entering the dining-room, in the person of Stripes, summoned us to caffy and the little concert. She beckoned me with a winning smile to the sofa, on which she made room for me, and where we could command a fine view of the backs of the young ladies who were performing the musical entertainment. ment. Very broad backs they were, too, strictly according to the prevailing mode, for crinoline or its substitutes is not an expensive luxury, and young people in the country can afford to be in the fashion at very trifling

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