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to reach the eastern shores of Asia,-the region of gold, and diamonds, and spices; to extend the sovereignty of Christian kings over realms and nations hitherto unapproached and unknown ;-and ultimately to perform a new crusade to the holy land, and ransom the sepulchre of our Saviour with the new found gold of the east.

Who shall believe the chimerical pretension? The learned men examine it, and pronounce it futile. The royal pilots have ascertained by their own experience that it is groundless. The priesthood have considered it, and have pronounced that sentence so terrific where the inquisition reigns, that it is a wicked heresy ;—the common sense, and popular feeling of men, have been roused first into disdainful and then into indignant exercise, toward a project, which, by a strange new chimera, represented one half of mankind walking with their feet toward the other half.

Such is the reception which his proposal meets. For a long time, the great cause of humanity, depending on the discovery of these fair continents, is involved in the fortitude, perseverance, and spirit of the solitary stranger, already past the time of life, when the pulse of adventure beats full and high. If he sink beneath the indifference of the great, the sneers of the wise, the enmity of the mass, and the persecution of a host of adversaries, high and low, and give up the fruitless and thankless pursuit of his noble vision, what a hope for mankind is blasted! But he does not sink. He shakes off his paltry enemies, as the lion shakes the dew drops from his mane. That consciousness of motive and of strength, which always supports the man who is worthy to be supported, sustains him in his hour of trial; and at length, after years of expectation, importunity, and hope deferred, he launches forth upon the unknown deep, to discover a new world, under the patronage of Ferdinand and Isabella.

The patronage of Ferdinand and Isabella !--Let us dwell for a moment on the auspices under which our country was brought to light. The patronage of Ferdinand and Isabella ! Yes, doubtless, they have fitted out a convoy, worthy the noble temper of the man, and the gallantry of his project. Convinced at length, that it is no daydream of a heated visionary, the fortunate sovereigns of Castile and Arragon, returning from their triumph over the last of the Moors,

and putting a victorious close to a war of seven centuries duration, have no doubt prepared an expedition of well appointed magnificence, to go out upon this splendid search for other worlds. They have made ready, no doubt, their proudest galleon, to waft the heroic adventurer upon his path of glory, with a whole armada of kindred spirits, to share his toils and honours.

Alas, from his ancient resort of Palos, which he first approached as a mendicant,--in three frail barks, of which two were without decks,―the great discoverer of America sails forth on the first voyage across the unexplored waters. Such is the patronage of kings. A few years pass by; he discovers a new hemisphere; the wildest of his visions fade into insignificance before the reality of their fulfilment; he finds a new world for Castile and Leon, and comes back to Spain loaded with iron fetters. Republics, it is said, are ungrateful;--such are the rewards of monarchs.

E. EVERETT.

127.-THE MOTHERS OF THE WEST.

A SPIRIT SO resolute, yet so adventurous-so unambitious, yet so exalted a spirit so highly calculated to awaken a love of the pure and the noble, yet so uncommon-never before actuated the ancestral matrons of any land or clime.

The mothers of our forest land!

Stout hearted dames were they;
With nerve to wield the battle brand,
And join the border fray.

Our rough land had no braver,

In its days of blood and strife—

Aye ready for severest toil,

Aye free to peril life.

The mothers of our forest land!

On Old Kan tuc kee's soil,

How shared they, with each dauntless band,

War's tempest, and life's toil!

They shrank not from the foeman

They quail'd not in the fight

But cheer'd their husbands through the day,

And soothed them through the night.

The motners of our forest land!
Their bosoms pillow'd men!
And proud were they by such to stand,
In hammock, fort or glen.
To load the sure old rifle-

To run the leaden ball

To stand beside a husband's place,
And fill it should he fall.

The mothers of our forest land!
Such were their daily deeds.
Their monument!-where does it stand?
Their epitaph!—who reads?
No braver dames had Sparta,
No nobler matrons Rome—
Yet who lauds, or honours them,
E'en in their own green home?

The mothers of our forest land!
They sleep in unknown graves :
And had they borne and nursed a band
Of ingrates or of slaves,

They'd not been more neglected!

But their graves shall yet be found, And their monuments dot here and there "The dark and bloody ground."

WESTERN LITERARY JOURNAL.

128.-EXTRACT FROM THE PARTISAN.

There

THESE old woods about Dorchester are famous. is not a wagon track-not a defile-not a clearing-not a traverse of these plains, which has not been consecrated by the strife for liberty; the close strife-the desperate struggle; the contest, unrelaxing, unyielding to the last, save only with death or conquest. These old trees have looked down upon blood and battles; the thick array and the solitary combat between single foes, needing no other witnesses. What tales might they not tell us! The sands have drunk deeply of holy and hallowed blood-blood that gave them value and a name, and made for them a place in all human recollection. The grass here has been beaten down. in

successive seasons, by heavy feet-by conflicting horsemen -by driving and recoiling artillery. Its deep green has been dyed with a yet deeper and a darker stain-the outpourings of the invader's veins, mingling with the generous streams flowing from bosoms that had but one hope-but one purpose-the unpolluted freedom and security of home; the purity of the threshold, the sweet repose of the domestic hearth from the intrusion of hostile feet-the only objects, for which men may brave the stormy and the brutal strife, and still keep the "whiteness of their souls."

The Carolinian well knows these old time places; for every acre has its tradition in this neighbourhood. He rides beneath the thick oaks, whose branches have covered regiments, and looks up to them with regardful veneration. Well he remembers the old defile at the entrance just above Dorchester village, where a red clay hill rises abruptly, breaking pleasantly the dead level of country all around it. The rugged limbs and trunk of a huge oak, which hung above its brow, and has been but recently overthrown, was of itself his historian. It was notorious in tradition as the gallows oak; its limbs being employed by both parties, as they severally obtained the ascendancy, for the purposes of summary execution. Famous, indeed, was all the partisan warfare in this neighbourhood, from the time of its commencement, with our story, in 1780, to the day, when, hopeless of their object, the troops of the invader withdrew to their crowded vessels, flying from the land they had vainly struggled to subdue. You should hear the old housewives dilate upon these transactions. You should hear them paint the disasters, the depression of the Carolinians! how their chief city was besieged and taken; their little army dispersed or cut to pieces; and how the invader marched over the country, and called it his. Anon, they would show you the little gathering in the swamp--the small scouting squad timidly stealing forth into the plain, and contenting itself with cutting off a foraging party or a baggage wagon, or rescuing a disconsolate group of captives on their way to the city and the prison ships. Soon, imboldened by success, the little squad is increased by numbers, and aims at larger game. Under some such leader as Colonel Washington, you should see them, anon, well mounted, streaking along the Ashley river road, by the peep of day,

well skilled in the management of their steeds, whose high necks beautifully arch under the curb, while, in obedience to their riders' will, they plunge fearlessly through brake and through brier, over the fallen tree, and into the suspicious water Heedless of all things but the proper achievement of their bold adventure, the warriors go onward, while the broadswords flash in the sunlight, and the trumpet cheers them with a tone of victory. And goodlier still is the sight, when, turning the narrow lane, thick fringed with the scrubby oak and the pleasant myrtle, you behold them come suddenly to the encounter with the hostile invaders. How they hurra, and rush to the charge with a mad emotion that the steed partakes-his ears erect, and his nostrils distended, while his eyeballs start forward, and grow red with the straining effort; then, how the riders bear down all before them, and, with swords shooting out from their cheeks, make nothing of the upraised bayonet and pointed spear, but, striking in, flank and front, carry confusion wherever they go-while the hot sands drink in the life blood of friend and foe, streaming through a thou sand wounds. Hear them tell of these, and of the "game cock," Sumter; how, always ready for fight, with a valour which was frequently rashness, he would rush into the hostile ranks, and, with his powerful frame and sweeping sabre, would single out for inveterate strife his own particular enemy. Then, of the subtle "swamp fox," Marion, who, slender of form, and having but little confidence in his own physical prowess, was never seen to use his sword in battle; gaining by stratagem and unexpected enterprise those advantages which his usual inferiority of force would never have permitted him to gain otherwise. They will tell you of his conduct and his coolness; of his ability, with small means, to consummate leading objects-the best proof of military talent; and of his wonderful command of his men; how they would do his will, though it led to the most perilous adventure, with as much alacrity as if they were going to a banquet. Of the men themselves, though in rags, almost starving, and exposed to all changes of the weather, how cheerfully, in the fastnesses of the swamp, they would sing their rude song about the capacity of their leader and their devotion to his person, in some such strain as that which follows:

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