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And destined in her day to be
Mighty as Rome-more nobly free.
My native land! my native land!

To whom my thoughts will fondly turn:
For her the warmest hopes expand,

For her the heart with fears will yearn.
O! may she keep her eye, like thee,
Proud eagle of the rocky wild,
Fix'd on the sun of liberty,

By rank, by faction unbeguiled;
Remembering still the rugged road
Our venerable fathers trod,

When they through toil and danger press'd,
To gain their glorious bequest,

And from each lip the caution fell

To those who follow'd, "Guard it well."

C. W. THOMPSON.

99.

-MY OWN FIRESIDE.

LET others seek for empty joys,
At ball, or concert, rout, or play;
While, far from fashion's idle noise,
Her gilded domes, and trappings gay,
I while the wintry eve away,-

'Twixt book and lute, the hours divide;
And marvel how I e'er could stray
From thee-my own Fireside!

My own Fireside! Those simple words
Can bid the sweetest dreams arise;
Awaken feeling's tenderest chords,

And fill with tears of joy my eyes!
What is there my wild heart can prize,
That doth not in thy sphere abide,
Haunt of my homebred sympathies,
My own-my own Fireside!

A gentle form is near me now;

A small white hand is clasp'd in mine;

I gaze upon her placid brow,

And ask what joys can equal thine!

A babe, whose beauty's half divine,

In sleep his mother's eyes doth hide ;-
Where my love seek a better shrine,
Than thou-my own Fireside?

What care I for the sullen roar

Of winds without, that ravage earth;
It doth but bid me prize the more
The shelter of thy hallow'd hearth ;—
To thoughts of quiet bliss give birth:
Then let the churlish tempest chide,
It cannot check the blameless mirth
That glads my own Fireside!

My refuge ever from the storm

Of this world's passion, strife, and care; Though thunder clouds the sky deform, Their fury cannot reach me there. There all is cheerful, calm, and fair, Wrath, malice, envy, strife, or pride, Hath never made its hated lair By thee-my own Fireside!

Thy precincts are a charmed ring,

Where no harsh feeling dares intrude;
Where life's vexations lose their sting;
Where even grief is half subdued:
And Peace, the halcyon, loves to brood.
Then, let the pamper'd fool deride,
I'll pay my debt of gratitude

To thee-my own Fireside!

Shrine of my household deities!

Fair scene of my home's unsullied joys! To thee my burden'd spirit flies,

When fortune frowns, or care annoys:

Thine is the bliss that never cloys :

The smile whose truth hath oft been tried;

What, then, are this world's tinsel toys
To thee-my own Fireside!

O, may the yearnings, fond and sweet,
That bid my thoughts be all of thee,
Thus, ever guide my wandering feet
To thy heart-soothing sanctuary!

Whate'er my future years may be ;
Let joy or grief my fate betide;
Be still an Eden bright to me
My own-My own Fireside !

A. A. WATTS.

100. THE INDIAN Hunter.

WHEN the summer harvest was gather'd in,
And the sheaf of the gleaner grew white and thin,
And the ploughshare was in its furrow left
Where the stubble land had been lately cleft,
An Indian hunter, with unstrung bow,

Look'd down where the valley lay stretch'd below.

He was a stranger, and all that day

Had been out on the hills, a perilous way,

But the foot of the deer was far and fleet,

And the wolf kept aloof from the hunter's feet,
And bitter feelings pass'd o'er him then,

As he stood by the populous haunts of men.

'The winds of autumn came over the woods
As the sun stole out from their solitudes,
The moss was white on the maple's trunk,
And dead from its arms the pale vine shrunk,
And ripen'd the mellow fruit hung, and red
Were the tree's wither'd leaves round it shed.

The foot of the reaper moved slow on the lawn,
And the sickle cut down the yellow corn-
The mower sung loud by the meadow side,
Where the mists of evening were spreading wide,
And the voice of the herdsman came up the lea,
And the dance went round by the greenwood tree.

Then the hunter turn'd away from that scene,
Where the home of his fathers once had been,
And heard by the distant and measured stroke,
That the woodman hew'd down the giant oak,
And burning thoughts flash'd o'er his mind
Of the white man's faith, and love unkind.

The moon of the harvest grew high and bright,
As her golden horn pierced the cloud of white-
A footstep was heard in the rustling brake,
Where the beach o'ershadow'd the misty lake,
And a mourning voice and a plunge from shore ;-
And the hunter was seen on the hills no more.

When years had pass'd on, by that still lake-side
The fisher look'd down through the silver tide,
And there, on the smooth yellow sand display'd,
A skeleton wasted and white was laid,

And 'twas seen, as the waters moved deep and slow, That the hand was still grasping a hunter's bow. LONGFELLOW.

101.-THE EXAMPLE OF THE NORTHERN TO THE SOUTHERN REPUBLICS OF AMERICA.

THE great triumphs of constitutional freedom, to which our independence has furnished the example, have been witnessed in the southern portion of our hemisphere. Sunk to the last point of colonial degradation, they have risen at once into the organization of three republics. Their struggle has been arduous; and eighteen years of checkered fortune have not yet brought it to a close. But we must not infer, from their prolonged agitation, that their independence is uncertain; that they have prematurely put on the toga virilis of freedom. They have not begun too soon; they have more to do. Our war of independence was shorter ;-happily we were contending with a government, that could not, like that of Spain, pursue an interminable and hopeless contest, in defiance of the people's will. Our transition to a mature and well adjusted constitution was more prompt than that of our sister republics; for the foundations had long been settled, the preparation long made. And when we consider that it is our example, which has aroused the spirit of independence from California to Cape Horn; that the experiment of liberty, if it had failed with us, most surely would not have been attempted by them; that even now our counsels and acts will operate as powerful precedents in this great family of republics, we learn the importance of the post which Providence has

assigned us in the world. A wise and harmonious adminis tration of the public affairs,—a faithful, liberal, and patriotic exercise of the private duties of the citizen,-while they secure our happiness at home, will diffuse a healthful influence through the channels of national communication, and serve the cause of liberty beyond the Equator and the Andes. When we show a united, conciliatory, and imposing front to their rising states, we show them, better than sounding eulogies can do, the true aspect of an independent republic; we give them a living example that the fireside policy of a people is like that of the individual man. the one, commencing in the prudence, order, and industry of the private circle, extends itself to all the duties of social life, of the family, the neighbourhood, the country; so the true domestic policy of the republic, beginning in the wise organization of its own institutions, pervades its territories with a vigilant, prudent, temperate administration; and extends the hand of cordial interest to all the friendly nations, especially to those which are of the household of liberty.

As

It is in this way that we are to fulfil our destiny in the world. The greatest engine of moral power, which human nature knows, is an organized, prosperous state. All that man, in his individual capacity, can do all that he can effect by his fraternities-by his ingenious discoveries and wonders of art,-or by his influence over others-is as nothing, compared with the collective, perpetuated influence on human affairs and human happiness of a well constituted, powerful commonwealth. It blesses generations with its sweet influence ;-even the barren earth seems to pour out its fruits under a system where property is secure, while her fairest gardens are blighted by despotism;-men, thinking, reasoning men, abound beneath its benignant sway;-nature enters into a beautiful accord, a better, purer asiento with man, and guides an industrious citizen to every rood of her smiling wastes;-and we see, at length, that what has been called a state of nature, has been most falsely, calumniously so denominated; that the nature of man is neither that of a savage, a hermit, nor a slave; but that of a member of a well ordered family, that of a good neighbour, a free citizen, a well informed, good man, acting with others like him. This is the lesson which

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