in Nepaul, many of the officers and soldiers were charmed to see, in exchange for the fruits of India, the apples, pears, raspberries, grapes, peaches, and nuts of Europe. Even the sound of an animal will awaken many of these affecting associations. Humboldt alludes to them. He was resting, a few days, under the roof of a Spaniard on the plateau of Cocollar: "Nothing," says he, "can be compared with the sense of that majestic stillness, produced by the appearance of the sky in this solitary spot. At night the tree, under which we sat; the luminous insects fluttering in the air; the constellations glittering in the south; every thing seemed to say, that we were far from our native land. If, in the midst of this exotic Nature, our ears caught from the bottom of a valley the tinkling of a cow-bell, the remembrance of our country was forthwith awakened. It was like the echo of distant sounds from beyond the seas; transporting us by its magic power from one hemisphere to the other. Strange wandering of the human imagination! Endless source of pleasure and of pain!" Some men live strangers in their own country; others are at home every where. Two persons, also, may live near neighbours without exchanging twenty words in twenty years! But should they chance to meet each other in a foreign country, they immediately associate; and seem, as if they could love each other like brothers. To sail in unknown seas, To land in countries hitherto unseen, seem as if they brought the power of converting every object, that reminds us of our country, into an object of attachment. In China, nothing in Nature pleased Harmodius so much, as the recognition of several species of chrysanthemums; and the rose, he most delighted to pluck, was the muy-guy, the only one he saw, that had the perfume of European roses. And when Moorcroft was on his journey to the lake Manasa nawara, on the Tartarian side of the Himalah mountains, he Sat with delight under two poplars, in which goldfinches regaled him with their songs. When Graham, Lord Lynedoch, was in Spain, actively engaged in military operations, none of his moments of leisure were so delightful as those passed in the recollection of his Scottish mountains. The Minstrel of the North beautifully alludes to these elegant associations of the highminded, chivalrous, and romantic Graham. Nor be his praise o'erpast, who strove to hide, He dream'd, 'mid alpine cliffs, of Athole's Hill, This naturally reminds us of a poem, written on the soil of India, by Heber, Bishop of Calcutta. So rich a shade, so green a sod, Our English fairies never trod; Yet who in Indian bower has stood, But thought on England's "good green wood?" And bless'd, beneath the palmy shade, Her hazel and her hawthorn glade, And breath'd a pray'r (how oft in vain!) To gaze upon her oaks again? One of the most beautiful passages of Lalla Rookh is that, in which the poet describes Zelica, in the midst of many seductive graces, turning at the sight of a few flowers, that reminded her of her native wells, her camels, and her father's tent. Xavier, surnamed the Apostle of the Indies, when at Goa, on the coast of Comorin, the Molucca Islands, and in Japan, where he succeeded in converting a vast number of barbarians to the apostolic faith, always remembered with melancholy pleasure the castle of Xavier, at the foot of the Pyrenees, where he was born, and spent his early years. Hard fate enough! Lone, friendless, exiled, flung Unknowing and unknown, wild, heathen hordes among! Christina, Queen of Sweden, on the contrary, seems to have despised her own country. She resigned her throne, therefore, and quitted it. When she came to the river, that separates the Swedish dominions from Denmark, she jumped out of her carriage, and exclaimed in a transport of joy, "Now I am free! I am out of Sweden, and trust in heaven that I never shall return." If you wish to know the value of your own home,-travela. The Welsh and Irish peasants know the value of Wales and Ireland by travelling in harvest time. The Savoyards make similar periodical migrations. The Valencians, too, leave their homes in summer, and traverse many provinces of Spain with the juice of the chufa; which, mixed with sugar, water, and cinnamon, becomes orgeat. During their journey they amuse themselves with singing songs, celebrating their native province. When Sonnini was questioned by an emir, why Europeans were so desirous of seeing the ruins of Tentyris and other cities of Africa, he told him, that the Franks having once been masters of Egypt, they were desirous of thus signalizing their love for the ancient seats of their ancestors. This was a reason the emir could perfectly understand; and Sonnini was, therefore, permitted to proceed. SPENSER gave renown to the mountains and rivers in the neighbourhood of his residence ; ARMSTRONG celebrated the Liddal; LANGHORNE pays tribute to his native landscapes d and AKENSIDE, amid the luxury of London, remembered the a Delicatus ille est adhuc cui Patria dulcis est; Perfectus vero, cui mundus exilium est.-Hug. de S. Victor. d Odes to the River Eden, and to the Genius of Westmoreland. d; romantic scenery of Northumberland with the liveliest plea sure: O ye Northumbrian shades, which overlook I have beheld all Persia and India, Georgia, Tartary, and Belochestaun," said a native of a wild valley, in Speiga, “but in all my travels, no place have I seen like Speiga "." And Khooshaul, the Afghaun poet, after encountering many misfortunes, wrote a poem, in the prison of Aurenzebe", which he concluded by thanking heaven, that, in all his misfortunes, he had still the satisfaction of being born in Afghaun. During the period of his exaltation, Cardinal Ximenes visited the village, in which he was born; and derived much pleasure in contrasting his former life with his then present condition. One of his attendants having argued the probability of the philosopher's stone from a passage in David, where he says, "he draws from the dust those, who are in indigence; and raises the poor above the dunghill, that he may place them above the first of his people." "No!" returned the Cardinal ; "that verse applies to men like myself. It exhibits to me my present state, and places before my eyes my former meanness. What have I done in the service of God, that he should have raised me from the dust to the post, which I now so unworthily occupy?" Many writers have extended this feeling not only to native cities, but even to cities of adoption. David had a great Athens; Pliny to affection for Jerusalem; Lysippus for Como ; Ausonius to Milan'; Cotta to Verona; Sannazaro to Venice; a Spanish poet to the city of Seville; and others to Benares, the Athens of India. What an affection, too, did Haller bear to the city of Berne; and Zimmerman to that of Zurich; on the banks of whose lake resided, in the village of Richerswhyll, that physician, of whom he has left such an amiable and enchanting portrait. And you, my Lelius, well remember the affectionate delight, with which La Fontaine always spoke of Heidelberg: its society; its ranges of mountains; its ruins and its gardens, overlooking a valley of enchanting beauty, watered by the Neckar and the Rhine: scenes, worthy of being visited by sages, when they Conversed with sages and immortal forms, On gracious errands sent f. If in peaceful moments, these associations are indulged with pleasure; in moments of sorrow and despair, they are, not unfrequently, the only nepenthes to a wounded heart. LUIS DE CAMÖENS,-that great pride and reproach of Portugal, whose genius was equalled only by his misfortunes,—had few other consolations for a long series of years. For when tortured in a distant land by fatigue and discipline; wretched with poverty; and sinking under innumerable misfortunes; the only throbs of rapture he enjoyed, were in those moments, a Meæ Deliciæ. b Et Mediolani mira omnia; copia rerum, Innumeræ multæque domus, facunda virorum с Verona, qui te viderit, Et non amarit, &c. &c-Carm. xiii. d Lux et Decus Ausoniæ, lib. iii. ecl. 1; lib. ii. ecl. 1, et epig. e Quien no ha vista Sevilla, No ha visto maravilla. The Portuguese, also, exhibit a similar instance of pardonable vanity:— "Quem nao ha visto Lisboa nao ha visto cosa boa." f Summer, 1. 525. Thomson seems to have delighted in this idea. See Autumn, 1. 1028; 1. 1346: probably from two passages in Lucretius.-De Rer. Nat. v. 1168; vi. 75. |