And this deep mountain valley was to him Rocking the trees, or driving cloud on cloud Were all things silent wheresoe'er he moved. He wrought not; neither field nor flock he owned: Of rights to him; but he remained, well pleased, The fellow-laborer and friend of him To whom the small inheritance had fallen. Nor deem that his mild presence was a weight That pressed upon his brother's house, for books Were ready comrades, whom he could not tire, Of whose society the blameless man Beguiled his leisure hours; refreshed his thoughts; His introverted spirit; and bestowed Which all acknowledged. The dark winter night, At length, when sixty years and five were told, A slow disease insensibly consumed The powers of nature; and a few short steps Of friends and kindred bore him from his home Of many tears, virtuous and thoughtful grief; LESSON LV. Forest Trees preparing for Winter.-N. A. REVIEW. It is interesting to observe the manner in which trees, as the year declines, prepare themselves to resist the cold, and to battle with the winter storms. They seem like vessels closing their ports, tightening their cordage, and taking in their sails, when only the veteran seaman would know that a tempest is on the way. They drop their leaves, bind close their trunks, and suspend their vital movements, as soon as they hear the first whispers of the gale. The substance of the tree retains an even temperature throughout the year: it draws the sap from a depth where it is colder in summer and warmer in winter than the external soil. The bark, too, a slow conductor of heat, serves to retain its warmth; and the tree seems to make this preparation, as if it knew that, should the cold penetrate and burst its vessels, it will surely die. It gets rid of its superfluous moisture as soon as possible, the danger of frost being increased in proportion to the water which it contains; for, as our cultivators know from the sad experience of the winter of 1831-2, a sudden cold after a wet season is very apt to be fatal; but, except in extraordinary times, they contrive to secure themselves so effectually, that the severest winter cannot destroy them. Meantime the fallen leaves, unlike all other vegetable decay, seem to aid in purifying the air. Any one, who has walked through a forest after the fall of the leaf, must have observed the sharp, peculiar smell of its decay. In short, every thing about these lords of the wood is striking to a thoughtful mind. Their graceful and majestic forms are pleasing to the eye; their construction and internal action excite the curiosity, and worthily employ the mind; they breathe health and fragrance upon the air, and in many, probably many yet undiscovered ways, declare themselves the friends of man. LESSON LVI. Falls of Niagara.-U. S. L. GAZETTE. WE passed about fifty rods under the Table rock, beneath whose brow and crumbling sides we could not stop to shudder, our minds were at once so excited and oppressed, as we approached that eternal gateway, which Nature has built of the motionless rocks and the rushing torrent, as a fitting entrance to her most awful magnificence. We turned a jutting corner of the rock, and the chasm yawned upon us. The noise of the cataract was most deafening; its headlong grandeur rolled from the very skies; we were drenched by the overflowings of the stream; our breath was checked by the violence of the wind, which, for a moment, scattered away the clouds of mist, when a full view of the torrent, raining down its diamonds in infinite profusion, opened upon us. Nothing could equal the flashing brilliancy of the spectacle; the weight of the falling waters made the very rock beneath us tremble, and from the cavern that received them issued a roar, as if the confined spirits of all who had ever been drowned, joined in a united scream for help! Here we stood, in the very jaws of Niagara,-deafened by an uproar, whose tremendous din seemed to fall upon the ear in tangible and ceaseless strokes, and surrounded by an unimaginable and oppressive grandeur. My mind recoiled from the immensity of the tumbling tide, and thought of time and eternity, and felt that nothing but its immortality could rise against the force of such an element. LESSON LVII. Lines written in a blank Leaf of La Perouse's Voyages.CAMPBELL. LOVED Voyager! whose pages had a zest I tracked his wanderings o'er the watery way, * Flower of the lily. Or gladly leaped on that far Tartar strand, Where Europe's anchor ne'er had bit the sand, And sweeping deer-herds dread no hunter's snare. Fair were his ships, expert his gallant crews, He ploughed the deep to bind no captive's chain- He came not back; conjecture's cheek grew pale, An age elapsed: no wreck told where or when |