"Well now, I can tell you," said the same simple old lady in the corner, who had let out the secret of Mrs. Nippers's morning walks. Some folks call that sponging when you go about getting your dinner here and your tea there, and sich like; as you know you and Meesy there does. That was what he meant, I guess." And the old lady quietly put up her knitting and prepared to go home. There have been times when I have thought that almost any degree of courtly duplicity would be preferable to the brusquerie of some of my neighbors: but on this occasion I gave all due credit to a simple and downright way of stating the plain truth. The acrofulous hint probably brightened my mental and moral vision somewhat. Mrs. Nippers's claret cloak and green bonnet, and Miss Clinch's ditto ditto, were in earnest requisition, and I do not think that either of them spent a day out that week. HOSPITALITY. Like many other virtues, hospitality is practised in its perfection by the poor. If the rich did their share, how would the woes of this world be lightened! how would the diffusive blessing irradiate a wider and a wider circle, until the vast confines of society would bask in the reviving ray! If every forlorn widow whose heart bleeds over the recollection of past happiness made bitter by contrast with present poverty and sorrow, found a comfortable home in the ample establishment of her rich kinsman; if every young man struggling for a foothold on the slippery soil of life, were cheered and aided by the countenance of some neighbor whom fortune had endowed with the power to confer happiness; if the lovely girls, shrinking and delicate, whom we see every day toiling timidly for a mere pittance to sustain frail life and guard the sacred remnant of gentility, were taken by the hand, invited and encouraged, by ladies who pass them by with a cold nod-but where shall we stop in enumerating the cases in which true, genial hospitality, practised by the rich ungrudgingly, without a selfish drawbackin short, practised as the poor practise it-would prove a fountain of blessedness, almost an antidote to half the keener miseries under which society groans! Yes: the poor-and children-understand hospitality after the pure model of Christ and his apostles. We can cite two instances, both true. In the western woods, a few years since, lived a very indigent Irish family. Their log-cabin scarcely protected them from the weather, and the potato field made but poor provision for the numerous rosy cheeks that shone through the unstopped chinks when a stranger was passing by. Yet when another Irish family poorer still, and way-worn, and travelsoiled, stopped at their door-children, household goods and all-they not only received and entertained them for the night, but kept them many days, sharing with this family, as numerous as their own, the one room and loft which made up their poor dwelling, and treating them in all respects as if they had been invited guests. And the mother of the same family, on hearing of the death of a widowed sister who had lived in New York, immediately set on foot an inquiry as to the residence of the children, with a view to coming all the way to the city to take the orphans home to her own house and bring them up with her own children. We never The nearest we recollect to have observed to this construction of the sacred injunction, among those who may be called the rich-in contradistinction to those whom we usually call the poor, though our kind friends were far from being what the world considers rich was in the case of a city family, who lived well, and who always on a Christmas day, Thanksgiving, or other festival time, when a dinner more generous than ordinary smoked upon the board, took care to invite their homeless friends who lived somewhat poorly, or uncomfortably-the widow from her low-priced boarding house; the young clerk, perhaps, far from his father's comfortable fireside; the daily teacher, whose only deficiency lay in the purse-these were the guests cheered at this truly hospitable board; and cheered heartily -not with cold, half-reluctant civility, but with the warmest welcome, and the pleasant appendix of the long, merry evening with music and games, and the frolic dance after the piano. We would not be understood to give this as a solitary instance, but we wish we knew of many such. The forms of society are in a high degree inimical to true hospitality. Pride has crushed genuine social feeling out of too many hearts, and the consequence is a cold sterility of intercourse, a soul-stifling ceremoniousness, a sleepless vigilance for self, totally incompatible with that free, flowing, genial intercourse with humanity, so nourishing to all the better feelings. The sacred love of home-that panacea for many of life's ills-suffers with the rest. Few people have homes nowadays. The fine, cheerful, every-day parlor, with its table covered with the implements of real occupation and real amusement; mamma on the sofa, with her needle; grandmamma in her great chair, knitting; pussy winking at the fire between them, is gone. In its place we have two gorgeous rooms, arranged for company but empty of human life; tables covered with gaudy, ostentatious, and useless articles a very mockery of anything like rational pastime the light of heaven as cautiously excluded as the delicious music of free, childish voices; every member of the family wandering in forlorn loneliness, or huddled in some back room or "basement," in which are collected the only means of comfort left them under this miserable arrangement. This is the substitute which hundreds of people accept in place of home! Shall we look in such places for hospitality? As soon expect figs from thistles. Invitations there will be occasionally, doubtless, for society" expects it; but let a country cousin present himself, and see whether he will be put into the state apartments. Let no infirm and indigent relative expect a place under such a roof. Let not even the humble individual who placed the steppingstone which led to that fortune, ask a share in the abundance which would never have had a be ginning but for his timely aid. "We have changed all that!" But setting aside the hospitality which has any reference to duty or obligation, it is to be feared that the other kind-that which is exercised for the sake of the pleasure it brings-is becoming more and more rare among us. The deadly strife of emula tion, the mad pursuit of wealth, the suspicion engendered by rivalry, leave little chance for the spontaneity, the abandon, the hearty sympathy which give the charm to social meetings and make the exercise of hospitality one of the highest pleasures. We have attempted to dignify our simple republicanism by far-away melancholy imitations of the Old World; but the incongruity between these forms and the true spirit of our institutions is such, that all we gain is a bald emptiness, gilded over with vulgar show. Real dignity, such as that of John Adams when he lived among his country neighbors as if he had never seen a court, we are learning to despise. We persist in making ourselves the laughing-stock of really refined people, by forsaking our true ground and attempting to stand upon that which shows our deficiencies to the greatest disadvantage. When shall we learn that the " spare feast-a radish and an egg," if partaken by the good and the cultivated, has a charm which no expense can purchase? When shall we look at the spirit rather than the semblance of things-when give up the shadow for the substance? P. HAMILTON MYERS Is the author of a series of well written, popular American historical romances, commencing with The First of the Knickerbockers, a tale of 1673, published by Putnam in 1848, and speedily followed by The Young Patroon, or Christmas in 1690, and The King of the Hurons. Mr. Myers is also the author of four prize tales, for two of which Bell Brandon or the Great Kentrip Estate, and The Miser's Heir or the Young Millionaire, he received two hundred dollars each, from the Philadelphia Dollar Newspaper. The others were entitled The Gold Crushers, and Ellen Welles, or the Siege of Fort Stanwix. P. Hamilton Myess These stories are of a pleasing sentiment, and neat in description. The author is a native of New York, born in Herkimer village, Herkimer county, in August, 1812. He is a lawyer by profession, and now a resident of Brooklyn, New York. In addition to his story-telling faculty, Mr. Myers is an agreeable essayist. In 1841 he delivered a poem, Science, before the Euglossian Society of Geneva College. THOMAS MACKELLAR Was born in the city of New York, August 12, 1812. His father came from Scotland to New York, and married into the Brasher family, once possessed of a considerable portion of the city lands. Young Mackellar was provided with a good education by his father, whose failing fortunes soon required his son's aid. Compelled early in life to seek a living, he learnt the business of a printer, and among other engagements in the calling became proof-reader in the office of Messrs. Harper & Brothers, doubtless qualified for the post by a diligent application to books which had become habitual to him. At this time in his seventeenth year, he constantly penned verses. In 1833 he left New York for Philadelphia, entered the stereotype foundry of Mr. L. Johnson as proof-reader, became foreman, and finally a partner in this important establishment, to which he is now attached. Mr. Mackellar's volumes of poetry, Droppings from the Heart, or Occasional Poems, published in 1844, and Lines for the Gentle and Loving in 1853, are written with earnestness and fluency, inspired by a devotional spirit and a tender feeling to the claims of family and friendship, expressive of the author's hopeful and hearty struggle with the world. They indicate a courage which meets with success in life, and a sympathy which finds a ready response from the good and intelligent. verses. True to his Scottish lineage, Mr. Mackellar has a turn for humor as well as sentiment in his His volume, Tam's Fortnight's Ramble and other Poems, puts his notions and opinions vented in the course of a holiday excursion on the Hudson River in a highly agreeable light, as the record of a manly personal experience. A POET AND HIS SONG. He was a man endowed like other men With strange varieties of thought and feeling: His bread was earned by daily toil; yet when A pleasing fancy o'er his mind came stealing, He set a trap and snared it by his art, And hid it in the bosom of his heart. He nurtured it and loved it as his own, And it became obedient to his beck; He fixed his name on its submissive neck, And graced it with all graces to him known, And then he bade it lift its wing and fly Over the earth, and sing in every ear Some soothing sound the sighful soul to cheer, Some lay of love to lure it to the sky. SINGING ON THE WAY. Far distant from my father's house And sing! and sing! The skies are dark, the thunders roll, And sing! and sing! The night is long and drear, I cry; } I see the morning-star arise, When care and sickness bow my frame, I'll ask Him for his promised grace, And sing! and sing! He'll not forsake me when I'm old, And sing! and sing! When grace shall bear me home to GoDDisrobed of mortal clay, I'll enter in the pearly gates, And sing upon the way! And sing! and sing! An everlasting day! WILLIAM STARBUCK MAYO. DR. MAYO is a descendant from the Rev. John Mayo, a clergyman of an ancient English family, who came to New England in 1630, and was the first pastor of the South Church at Boston. On his mother's side he traces his descent through the Starbuck family to the earliest settlers of Nantucket. He was born at Ogdensburg, on the northern frontier of New York, whither the family had removed in 1812, and was educated at the school of the Rev. Josiah Perry, a teacher of high local reputation. At the age of twelve years he entered the academy of Potsdam, where he received a good classical education; and at seventeen commenced the study of medicine at the College of Physicians and Surgeons in the city of New York. After receiving his diploma, in 1833, he devoted himself for several years to the practice of his profession. He then, urged in part by the pursuit of health and in part by the love of adventure, determined to make a tour of exploration to the interior of Africa. He was prevented, however, from penetrating further than the Barbary States. After an excursion in Spain he returned home. ROBERTS SC N I Mayo In 1849 Dr. Mayo published Kaloolah, or Journeyings to the Djebel Kumri, a work which he had written some time before. It purports to be the Autobiography of Jonathan Romer, a youth who, after various romantic and marvellous adventures in his native American woods, goes to Africa, where he rivals Munchausen in his traveller's experiences. He finally penetrates to a purely fictitious Utopia, where he indulges in some quiet satire at the usages of civilization, and in his description of the great city of the region furnishes some valuable hints on municipal sanitary reform. He marries Kaloolah, a beautiful princess-" not too dark for a brunette" -whom he has rescued from a slave barracoon and protected through many subsequent scenes of danger, and settles down to domestic felicity in the city of Killoam. The story is crowded with exciting and varied incident, and the interest is maintained throughout with dramatic skill. Kaloolah was favorably received by the public, and was followed in 1850 by The Berber, or the Mountaineer of the Atlas, a story the scene of which is laid in Africa at the close of the seventeenth century. It is of more regular construction than Kaloolah, and equally felicitous in dramatic interest. Both abound in descriptions of the natural scenery and savage animals of the tropics and other regions, minutely accurate in scientific detail. Dr. Mayo's next volume was a collection of short tales, which he had previously published anonymously in magazines, with the title suggested by the prevalent California excitement of the day-Romance Dust from the Historic Placer. He soon after married and spent a year or two in Europe. Since his return he has resided in New York. A LION IN THE PATH. It was early on the morning of the sixth, that, accompanied by Kaloolah and the lively Clefenha, I ascended the bank for a final reconnoissance of the country on the other bank of the river. It was not my intention to wander far, but, allured by the beauty of the scene, and the promise of a still better view from a higher crag, we moved along the edge of the bank until we had got nearly two miles from our camp. At this point the line of the bank curved towards the river so as to make a beetling promontory of a hundred feet perpendicular descent. The gigantic trees grew quite on the brink, many of them throwing their long arms far over the shore below. The trees generally grew wide apart, and there was little or no underwood, but many of the trunks were wreathed with the verdure of parasites and creepers, so as to shut up, mostly, the forest vistas with immense columns of green leaves and flowers. The stems of some of these creepers were truly wonderful: one, from which depended large bunches of scarlet berries, had, not unfrequently, stems as large as a man's body. In some cases, one huge plant of this kind, ascending with an incalculable prodigality of lignin, by innumerable convolutions, would stretch itself out, and, embracing several trees in its folds, mat them together in one dense mass of vegetation. Suddenly we noticed that the usual sounds of the forest had almost ceased around us. Deep in the woods we could still hear the chattering of monkeys and the screeching of parrots. Never before had our presence created any alarm among the denizens of the tree-tops; or, if it had, it had merely excited to fresh clamour, without putting them to flight. We looked around for the cause of this sudden retreat. Perhaps," I replied to Kaloolah's inquiry, "there is a storm gathering, and they are gone to seek a shelter deeper in the wood." We advanced close to the edge of the bank, and looked out into the broad daylight that poured down from above on flood and field. There was the same bright smile on the distant fields and hills; the same clear sheen in the deep water; the same lustrous stillness in the perfumed air; not a single prognostic of any commotion among the elements. I placed my gun against a tree, and took a seat upon an exposed portion of one of its roots. Countless herds of animals, composed of quaggas, zebras, gnus, antelopes, hart-beests, roeboks, springboks, buffalos, wild-boars, and a dozen other kinds, for which my recollection of African travels furnished no names, were roaming over the fields on the other side of the river, or quietly reposing in the shade of the scattered mimosas, or beneath the groups of lofty palms, A herd of thirty or forty tall ungainly figures came in sight, and took their way, with awkward but rapid pace, across the plain. I knew them at once to be giraffes, although they were the first that we had seen. I was straining my eyes to discover the animal that pursued them, when Kaloolah called to me to come to her. She was about fifty yards farther down the stream than where I was sitting. With an unaccountable degree of carelessness, I arose and went towards her, leaving my gun leaning against the tree. As I advanced, she ran out to the extreme point of the little promontory I have mentioned, where her maid was standing, and pointed to something over the edge of the cliff. "Oh, Jon'than!" she exclaimed, "what a curious and beautiful flower! Come, and try if you can get it for me!" Advancing to the crest of the cliff, we stood looking down its precipitous sides to a point some twenty feet below, where grew a bunch of wild honeysuckles. Suddenly a startling noise, like the roar of thunder, or like the boom of a thirty-two pounder, rolled through the wood, fairly shaking the sturdy trees, and literally making the ground quiver beneath our feet. Again it came, that appalling and indescribably awful sound! and so close as to completely stun us. Roar upon roar, in quick succession, now announced the coming of the king of beasts. "The lion! the lion!-Oh, God of mercy, where is my gun?" I started forward, but it was too late. Alighting, with a magnificent bound, into the open space in front of us, the monster stopped, as if somewhat taken aback by the novel appearance of his quarry, and crouching his huge carcass close to the ground, uttered a few deep snuffling sounds, not unlike the preliminary crankings and growlings of a heavy steam-engine, when it first feels the pressure of the steam. He was, indeed, a monster!-fully twice as large as the largest specimen of his kind that was ever condemned, by gaping curiosity, to the confinement of the cage. His body was hardly less in size than that of a dray-horse; his paw as large as the foot of an elephant; while his head!-what can be said of such a head? Concentrate the fury, the power, the capacity and the disposition for evil of a dozen thunder-storms into a round globe, about two feet in diameter, and one would then be able to get an idea of the terrible expression of that head and face, enveloped and set off as it was by the dark frame-work of bristling mane. The lower jaw rested upon the ground; the mouth was slightly open, showing the rows of white teeth and the blood-red gums, from which the lips were retracted in a majestic and right kingly grin. The brows and the skin around the eyes were corrugated into a splendid glory of radiant wrinkles, in the centre of which glowel two small globes, like opals, but with a dusky lustrousness that no opal ever yet attained. For a few moments he remained motionless, and then, as if satisfied with the result of his close scrutiny, he began to slide along the ground towards us; slowly one monstrous paw was protruded after the other; slowly the huge tufted tail waved to and fro, sometimes striking his hollow flanks, and oc casionally coming down upon the ground with a sound like the falling of heavy clods upon a coffin. There could be no doubt of his intention to charge us, when near enough for a spring. And was there no hope? Not the slightest, at least for myself. It was barely possible that one victim would satisfy him, or that, in the contest that was about to take place, I might, if he did not kill me at the first blow, so wound him as to indispose him for any further exercise of his power, and that thus Kaloolah would escape. As for me, I felt that my time had come. With no weapon but my long knife, what chance was there against such a monster? I cast one look at the gun that was leaning so carelessly against the tree beyond him, and thought how easy it would be to send a bullet through one of those glowing eyes into the depths of that savage brain. Never was there a fairer mark! But, alas! it was impossible to reach the gun! Truly, "there was a lion in the path." I turned to Kaloolah, who was a little behind me. Her face expressed a variety of emotions; she could not speak or move, but she stretched out her hand, as if to pull me back. Behind her erouched the black, whose features were contracted into the awful grin of intense terror; she was too much frightened to scream, but in her face a thousand yells of agony and fear were incarnated. I remember not precisely what I said, but, in the fewest words, I intimated to Kaloolah that the lion would, probably, be satisfied with attacking me; that she must run by us as soon as he sprang upon me, and, returning to the camp, waste no time, but set out at once under the charge of Hugh and Jack. She made no reply, and I waited for none, but, facing the monster, advanced slowly towards him— the knife was firmly grasped in my right hand, my left side a little turned towards him, and my left arin raised, to guard as much as possible against the first crushing blow of his paw. Further than this I had formed no plan of battle. In such a contest the mind has but little to do--all depends upon the instinct of the muscles; and well for a man if good training has developed that instinct to the highest. I felt that I could trust mine, and that my brain need not bother itself as to the manner my muscles were going to act. Within thirty feet of my huge foe I stoppedcool, calm as a statue; not an emotion agitated me, No hope, no fear: death was too certain to permit either passion. There is something in the conviction of the immediate inevitableness of death that represses fear; we are then compelled to take a better look at the king of terrors, and we find that he is not so formidable as we imagined. Look at him with averted glances and half-closed eyes, and he has a most imposing, overawing presence; but face him, eye to eye; grasp his proffered hand manfully, and he sinks from a right royal personage into a contemptible old gate-keeper on the turnpike of life. I had time to think of many things, although it must not be supposed from the leisurely way in which I here tell the story that the whole affair occupied much time. Like lightning, flashing from link to link along a chain conductor, did memory illuminate, almost simultaneously, the chain of incidents that measured my path in life, and that connected the present with the past. I could see the whole of my back track “blazed " as clearly as ever was a forest path by a woodman's axe; and ahead! ah, there was not much to see ahead! "Twas but a short view; death hedged in the scene. In a few minutes my eyes would be opened to the pleasant sights beyond; but, for the present, death commanded all attention. And such a death! But why such a death? What better death, except on the battlefield, in defence of one's country? To be killed by a lion! Surely there is a spice of dignity about it, maugre the being eaten afterwards. Suddenly the monster stopped, and erected his tail, stiff and motionless, in the air. Strange as it may seem, the conceit occurred to me that the motion of his tail had acted as a safety-valve to the pent up muscular energy within: "He has shut the steam off from the 'scape-pipe, and now he turns it on to his locomotive machinery. God have mercy upon me! -He comes!" But he did not come! At the instant, the light figure of Kaloolah rushed past me: "Fly, fly, Jon'than!" she wildly exclaimed, as she dashed forward directly towards the lion. Quick as thought, I divined her purpose, and sprang after her, grasping her dress and pulling her forcibly back almost from within those formidable jaws. The astonished animal gave several jumps sideways and backwards, and stopped, crouching to the ground and growling and lashing his sides with renewed fury. He was clearly taken aback by our unexpected charge upon him, but it was evident that he was not to be frightened into abandoning his prey. His mouth was ma le up for us, and there could be no doubt, if his motions were a little slow, that he considered us as good as gorged. Fly, fly, Jon'than!" exclaimed Kaloolah, as she struggled to break from my grasp. Leave me! Leave me to die alone, bat oh! save yourself, quick! along the bank. You can escape-fly!" “Never, Kaloolah,” I replied, fairly forcing her with quite an exertion of strength behind me. *Back, back! Free my arin! Quick, quick! He comes!" 'Twas no time for gentleness. Roughly shaking her relaxing grasp from my arm she sunk powerless, yet not insensible, to the ground, while I had just time to face the monster and plant one foot forward to receive him. He was in the very act of springing! His huge carcass was even rising under the impulsion of his contracting muscles, when his action was arrested in a way so unexpected, so wonderful, and so startling, that my senses were for the moment thrown into perfect confusion. Could I trust my sight, or was the whole affair the illusion of a horrid dream? It seemel as if one of the gigantic creepers I have mentioned had suddenly quitted the canopy above, and, endowed with life and a huge pair of widely distended jaws, had darted with the rapidity of lightning upon the crouching beast. There was a tremendous shaking of the tree tops, and a confused wrestling, and jumping, and whirling over and about, amid a cloud of upturned roots, and earth, and leaves, accompanied with the most terrific roars and groans. As I looked again, vision grew more distinct. An immense body, gleaming with purple, green, and gold, appeared convoluted around the majestic branches overhead, and stretching down, was turned two or three times around the struggling lion, whose head and neck were almost concealed from sight within the cavity of a pair of jaws still more capacious than his own. Thus, then, was revealed the cause of the sudden silence throughout the woods. It was the presence of the boa that had frightened the monkey and feathered tribes into silence. How opportunely was his presence manifested to us! A moment more and it would have been too late. Gallantly did the lion struggle in the folds of his terrible enemy, whose grasp each instant grew more firm and secure, and most astounding were those frightful yells of rage and fear. The huge body of the snake, fully two feet in diameter where it depended from the trees, presented the most curious appearances, and in such quick succession that the eye could scarcely follow them. At one moment smooth and flexile, at the next rough and stiffened, or contracted into great knots-at one moment overspread with a thousand tints of reflected color, the next distended so as to transmit through the skin the golden gleams of the animal lightning that coursed up and down within. Over and over rolled the struggling beast, but in vain all his strength, in vain all his efforts to free himself. Gradually his muscles relaxed in their exertions, his roar subsided to a deep moan, his tongue protruded from his mouth, and his fetid breath, mingled with a strong, sickly odor from the serpent, diffused itself through the air, producing a sense of oppression, and a feeling of weakness like that from breathing some deleterious gas. I looked around. Kaloolah was on her knees, and the negress insensible upon the ground a few paces behind her. A sensation of giddiness warned me that it was time to retreat. Without a word I raised Kaloolah in my arms, ran towards the now almost motionless animals, and, turning along the bank, reached the tree against which my gun was leaning. Darting back I seized the prostrate negress and bore her off in the same way. By this time both females had recovered their voices, Clefenha exercising hers in a succession of shrieks, that compelled me to shake her somewhat rudely, while Kaloolah eagerly besought me to hurry back to the camp. There was now, however, no occasion for hurry. The recovery of my gun altered the state of the case, and my curiosity was excited to witness the process of deglutition on a large scale which the boa was probably about to exhibit. It was impossible, however, to resist Kaloolah's entreaties, and, after stepping up closer to the animals for one good look, I reluctantly consented to turn back. The lion was quite dead, and with a slow motion the snake was uncoiling himself from his prey and from the tree above. As well as I could judge, without seeing him straightened out, he was between ninety and one hundred feet in length-not quite so long as the serpent with which the army of Regulus had its famous battle, or as many of the same animals that I have since seen, but, as the reader will allow, a very respectable sized snake. I have often regretted that we did not stop until at least he had commenced his meal. Had I been alone I should have done so. As it was, curiosity had to yield to my own sense of prudence, and to Kaloolah's fears. We returned to our camp, where we found our raft all ready. The river was fully half a mile wide, and it was necessary to make two trips; the first with the women and baggage, and the last with the horses. It is unnecessary to dwell in detail upon all the difficulties we encountered from the rapid currents and whirling eddies of the stream; suffice it that we got across in time for supper and a good night's sleep, and early in the morning resumed our march through the most enchanting country in the world. WILLIAM HENRY CHANNING, A GRADUATE of Harvard in 1829, and of the Cambridge divinity school in 1833, is a nephew of the late Dr. William Ellery Channing, and the son of the late Francis Dana Channing. He is the author of several valuable biographical publications, including the Memoirs of the Rev. James H. Per |