whale from which spermaceti is extracted.

6 ĮM-MER'SION. Act of putting wholly

under water or other fluid, or the state of being wholly under water; 7 BEAR WIDE ŎFF. To keep away at a ducking. a distance from any thing. 6 SPERM WHĀLE. A blunt-headed 8 PŎN'DER-OUS. Heavy.

XXXVII. — THE SOLITUDE OF ALEXANDER

SELKIRK.

COWPER.

[In 1704, Alexander Selkirk, a Scotchman, who was sailing-master of an English privateer, in consequence of a quarrel with the captain, was put ashore, at his own request, on the uninhabited island of Juan Fernandez, which lies about four hundred miles from the coast of Chili. He was well supplied with clothing, instruments, and arms, and remained on the island in solitude over four years, when he was taken off by an English vessel. His story is supposed to have suggested the well-known romance of Robinson Crusoe. This poem expresses the sentiments Selkirk may be imagined to have felt while on his solitary island.]

1. I AM monarch of all I survey;

My right there is none to dispute;
From the centre all round to the sea,
I am lord of the fowl and the brute.
O Solitude! where are the charms

That sages have seen in thy face?
Better dwell in the midst of alarms

Than reign in this horrible place.

2. I am out of humanity's' reach;

I must finish my journey alone;
Never hear the sweet music of speech;
I start at the sound of my own.
The beasts that roam over the plain
My form with indifference see:
They are so unacquainted with man,
Their tameness is shocking to me.

3. Society, friendship, and love,
Divinely bestowed upon man,
O, had I the wings of a dove,

How soon would I taste you again!
My sorrows I then might assuage

2

In the ways of religion and truth;
Might learn from the wisdom of age,
And be cheered by the sallies of youth.

3

4. Religion! what treasure untold
Resides in that heavenly word!
More precious than silver and gold,
Or all that this earth can afford.
But the sound of the church-going bell
These valleys and rocks never heard,
Ne'er sighed at the sound of a knell,

Or smiled when a Sabbath appeared.

5. Ye winds, that have made me your sport
Convey to this desolate shore
Some cordial, endearing report

Of a land I shall visit no more:
My friends, do they now and then send
A wish or a thought after me?
O, tell me I yet have a friend,

Though a friend I am never to see.

6. How fleet is a glance of the mind! Compared with the speed of its flight. The tempest itself lags behind,

And the swift-wingéd arrows of light.
When I think of my own native land,
In a moment I seem to be there;
But, alas! recollection at hand
Soon hurries me back to despair.

7. But the sea-fowl is gone to her nest,
The beast is laid down in his lair";
Even here is a season of rest,

And I to my cabin repair.
There's mercy in every place;
And mercy, encouraging thought!
Gives even affliction a grace,

And reconciles man to his lot.

1 HỤ-MAN'1-TY. The nature of man; | 4 KNĚLL. Sound of a bell rung at a the human race; mankind.

2 AŞ-SUĀĢE' (-Swāj'). Soften; allay; moderate; soothe.

8 SĂL'LIES. Quick or sprightly exertions or sayings; frolics.

funeral, or announcing a death.

5 CÖRD'IAL. Comforting; hearty.

6 REC-OL-LEC'TION. Act of recalling to mind things once known.

7 LAIR. Bed or couch of a wild beast.

[Charles Sprague was born in Boston, October 25, 1791, and has constantly resided here. His longer poems are fervid and brilliant, and polished in their versification. He has written many charming small pieces. The following extract is taken from a fourth of July oration.]

1. Not many generations ago, where you now sit, circled with all that exalts and embellishes civilized life, the rank thistle nodded in the wind, and the wild fox dug his hole unscared. Here lived and loved another race of beings. Beneath the same sun that rolls over your heads, the Indian hunter pursued the panting deer; gazing on the same moon that smiles for you, the Indian lover wooed his dusky mate.

1

2. Here the wigwam blaze beamed on the tender and helpless, the council fire glared on the wise and daring. Now they dipped their noble limbs in your sedgy lakes, and now they paddled the light canoe along your rocky shores. Here they warred; the echoing whoop, the

bloody grapple, the defying death-song, all were here; and when the tiger strife was over, here curled the smoke of peace.

3. Here, too, they worshipped; and from many a dark bosom went up a pure prayer to the Great Spirit. He had not written his laws for them on tables' of stone, but he had traced them on the tables of their hearts. The poor child of nature knew not the God of revelation, but the God of the universe he acknowledged in every thing around.

4. He beheld him in the star that sunk in beauty behind his lonely dwelling; in the sacred orb that flamed on him from his midday throne; in the flower that snapped in the morning breeze; in the lofty pine, that defied a thousand whirlwinds; in the timid warbler, that never left its native grove; in the fearless eagle, whose untired pinion was wet in clouds; in the worm that crawled at his feet; and in his own matchless form, glowing with a spark of that light, to whose mysterious source he bent, in humble, though blind adoration.

5. And all this has passed away. Across the ocean came a pilgrim bark, bearing the seeds of life and death. The former were sown for you; the latter sprang up in the path of the simple native. Two hundred years have changed the character of a great continent, and blotted forever from its face a whole peculiar people. Art has usurped the bowers of nature, and the children of education have been too powerful for the tribes of the ignorant.

6. Here and there a stricken few remain; but how unlike their bold, untamed, untamable progenitors! The Indian, of falcon glance and lion bearing, the theme of the touching ballad, the hero of the pathetic tale, is gone! and his degraded offspring crawl upon the soil where he walked in majesty, to remind us how miserable is man when the foot of the conqueror is on his neck.

7. As a race, they have withered from the land. Their arrows are broken, their springs are dried up, their cabins are in the dust. Their council-fire has long since gone out on the shore, and their war-cry is fast dying to the untrodden west. Slowly and sadly they climb the distant mountains, and read their doom in the setting sun. They are shrinking before the mighty tide which is pressing them away; they must soon hear the roar of the last wave, which will settle over them forever.

1 DUSK'y. Dark colored.

2 WIG'WÂM. An Indian hut or cabin. * SEDG'y. Filled with or having sedge, a grass-like or rush-like plant.

4 WHOOP. A loud shout or cry.

5 TA'BLES. Tablets; plane surfaces. PRO-ĢEN'I-TORŞ. Ancestors; forefathers.

XXXIX.

MOUNT AUBURN.

STORY.

[Joseph Story was born in Marblehead, Massachusetts, September 18, 1779, and died in Cambridge, September 10, 1845. He was a judge of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1811 till his death. He was eminent as a judge, a juridical writer, and a teacher of law. The following extract is from an address delivered at the consecration of the cemetery of Mount Auburn, September 24, 1831.]

1. We stand here upon the borders of two worlds; and, as the mood of our minds may be, we may gather lessons of profound wisdom by contrasting the one with the other, or indulge in the dreams of hope and ambition, or solace our hearts by melancholy meditations.

2. Who is there, that, in the contemplation of such a scene, is not ready to exclaim, with the enthusiasm of the poet :

"Mine be the breezy hill that skirts the down 1,

Where a green, grassy turf is all I crave,

With here and there a violet bestrown,

Fast by a brook, or fountain's murmuring wave;

And may the evening sun shine sweetly on my grave.”