ate devotion. He breathed his love in poetry and mu- vow been kept thus faithfully, we might yet be happy. sic. I was fascinated, dazzled-nay, my heart was But you were perjured when you swore to be my protouched. He was wealthy. I was poor, with no dow-tector and my friend for life." er but my charms. My guardian-for alas! I was an or- "Listen to me," exclaimed Morden. "In that, you phan-was opposed to a union so unequal, for he natu- are deceived. My villiany was defeated by the honesty rally reasoned that the passion of so celebrated a man of the agent I employed. He, repenting before it was would demand a more brilliant idol to render his homage too late, procured a real priest, and our marriage was permanent. Morden offered me a private union. I solemnized by the sanction of divine and human laws. consented. Under the cover of the night I fled from Here are the proofs." And here he extended to his the house of my noble protector to the arms of a lover. injured wife the papers which substantiated his avowal. A few stages from the city we stopped at a rustic inn. She perused them in silence, and when she again raised There a priest appeared and performed the ceremony. her eyes they were suffused in tears. For a short time we were happy. We lived in a lovely village secluded from the world. A barrier of hills, green with luxuriant foliage to the summits, shut us out from the busy world-its intrusive comments. A blue lake embowered in foliage reflected our charming dwelling and garden. Here floated the bark of my lover bridegroom, while at midnight stole up from the calm waters the music of his unexpected serenade. Ah! what a fairy life was that. I even now shed tears when memory recalls it. At length the hour arrived when Morden wearied of his retirement, where he no longer heard the plaudits of the world, nor received the homage of a brilliant coterie. He bore his situation with sullen fortitude; but soon his indifference ripened into disgust; he, he, deserted me-aye, fled. I was overwhelmed with despair, but the birth of a daughter came like a sunbeam to my heart. Judge, then, my horror when I received intelligence that the marriage ceremony was false—that I was a dupe—a victim. I next heard of Morden at another's feet-the accepted lover of a fascinating woman. The proof of the completion of his perfidy is before me. You are his son." 'And Isabel, his daughter! Gracious Heaven! what a sudden light has broken in upon me." "This morning," continued the lady, "we met for the first time-for you know we both have lived secluded from the world since our arrival in this village. Agitated, alarmed, overwhelmed, I commanded him to leave the house, and fled from his presence. I will never see him more." "Never see him more!" repeated a deep and solemn voice which made the lady tremble. "Behold him here!" Arthur turned and saw his father. "Eliza!" said Morden, "look at me, and see whether my life has passed happily since like a traitor I fled from my duty and from thee. Look upon this brow, furrowed by the lines of care. These locks, whitened, not by age, but grief. I have wandered far and wide-learning, business, war, have by turns, engrossed my time, but my heart has never been false to you." "Hear me, Eliza," said Morden in a tone of deep earnestness, "hear me ere I depart from before your face for ever-ere I go in bitter solitude to expiate my offences. I was voluntarily a wanderer from you but a brief period. A guilty passion led me for a while astray. I was spurned, rejected with contempt. I awoke to a full sense of the enormity of my offences. I resolved to see you and offer all that was in my power-my hand and fortune. I came back to throw myself at your feet, to do you justice, and to die. But that happiness was not reserved for me. I found our little paradise deserted-weeds had choked up its garden, and the cold winds of Autumn howled gloomily over its blue waters. I sought to trace you, but in vain. My agony, my despair, no words can picture. For years I sought you faithfully. Plunged as I have been into every species of excitement, they brought no balm to my broken heart. At length I have found you. I have given you the proofs of the legitimacy of our union. I dare not hope for forgiveness, but this I ask, do not destroy the happiness of these young hearts; let me see Isabel and Arthur Leslie happy in each other; as for me, no matter what becomes of me." Mrs. Morden had risen from her chair; the tears were coursing rapidly down her cheeks, and her bosom heaved with agitation. Arthur sprang forward, caught her hand, raised it respectfully to his lips, kissed it, and then placed it in that of his father. It was precisely at this point of time that Isabel, pale and disordered, entered the apartment. She was speedily informed of all that had occurred. The joyful tidings brought back the color to her pallid cheeks, and more than the usual animation to her lustrous eye. We will not dwell upon the happiness of the re-united lovers. That night, when Arthur bade good-night to his beloved, he pressed her lips and she forgave him. Boston, Mass. F. A. D. EXPERIENCE teaches that the sword, the faggot, ex "Never false to me!" cried the lady, "there stands ile, and proscription, are better calculated to irritate the living witness of your faithlessness." "You are mistaken," replied Morden, calmly. "Arthur is the child of a dear comrade who died, committing his infant son to my care. I swore to bring him up as the child of my bosom; to adopt and educate him in a manner worthy of his gallant father. I have kept my vow." than to heal a disease which, having its source in the mind, cannot be relieved by remedies that act only on the body. The most afficacious are sound doctrines and repeated instructions, which make a ready impression, when inculcated with mildness. Every thing else bows to the sovereign authority of the laws; but religion alone is not to be com "Ah!" exclaimed the weeping lady, "had every manded. Original. GLIMPSES AT GOTHAM. NUMBER I. BY PROFESSOR INGRAHAM. "Nos populo damus." Stuyvesant, be called a Dutch city: for such, with some modifications it continues to be. With the name Manhattan, (now with good taste being revived,) it has something of the spirit of the old town in its composition. Its old families are Dutch, or of Dutch descent. Dutch signs meet the eye at every turn. The floating population, deducting Irish and Africans, is mostly Dutch, and a majority of the laboring and journeymen artisans are of the same trans-atlantic origin. If therefore, there exists any distinctive feature in New York, compared with other cities, it consists in the Dutch air every where perceptible. It has been sagaciously remarked that a peculiar individual of New York consists in the elongation of the nasal organs of its citizens. Now, that there are long noses in Gotham is doubtless true. But that there are to be found longer noses in Gotham, and more longer noses than in the other cities of the union requires demonstration. Sceptical myself respecting this round assertion, I sought this salvo to my credulity before I gave it implicit credence. I determined to see faithfully as impartially, and to admit no conclusion until I should be thoroughly convinced. UNLIKE other prominent metropolic, cis-atlantic, or trans-atlantic, anti-diluvian, or post-diluvian, New York possesses no individual civic character. It is a city sui generis. Baltimore is characterised by its high tone of refinement, its fashion and aristocracy, with decidedly a southern tone pervading its society. Philadelphia boasts its accurate taste in architecture and costume; its stable and most moral population, its quiet tone, the most polished elegance of manners is subdued by a quakerlike simplicity; its just taste reigning pre-eminent and like a leaven pervading all social ranks; and its literature, which next to religion is honored and cherished. Boston prides herself in her merchant princes; her literary nobility; her great names; her scholars; her opulence, and boasts too her moral and religious character. Literature is its characteristic feature, and it probably has produced and now contains more learned men than any other American city. To go on with the list. Portland is celebrated for its lawyers and beautiful women. Cincinnati for its doctors, scholars, and social literati. Louisville for its commercial enterprise. Lexington for its opulence and refinement. New Orleans for its modishness and prevailing French tone of manners. Every city has a distinctive feature-an individual character-and one too by which its citizens may most generally be identified. But Manhattan, Gotham, the glory of the key-stone state! the sovereign of Ameri-trumps. can cities is yet without any distinctive mark. It has no identity, emphatically no character! A New Yorker! what is he? As mysterious and indefinable a personage as the shadowless Peter Schlemihil. The Philadelphian, -the Baltimorean,—the Bostonian, each is a marked man! An individual of a known species. He is classed! With each, we at once associate his proper metropolitan character. Dr. Franklin used to say, in the times when the side-walks of Gotham were constructed of round Broadway rewarded my search in presenting three aquilines to two pugs-while the usual intermixture of bottle, Roman, and piquant, were observable. But then every third aquiline might have belonged to a stranger; and I felt charitably disposed to let Gotham answer only for her own sins. The omnibusses gave five Wellington's out of seven, and Wall Street four out of five. Yet my desire to arrive at the whole truth and learn the right, prevented me from jumping to the irresistible conclusion that this general inspection offered. I resolved to wait, yet a while longer, and see if some other day the cards might not shuffle differently and turn up other After three days diligent investigation, during which the visages of some hundred thousand bipeds must have passed under my scrutiny, the wisdom of my forbearance was evident; for on casting up both sides, a small balance was left in favor of the short noses. "Be they bottle, pug, or sausage," That is to say, this class of brief noses carried the majority. I had now nearly made up my mind in relation to this paving stones-that he could tell a New Yorker in the nosological branch of human science and had arrived at streets of Pennsylvania by his walk-the smooth pave- & conclusion in no ways flattering to the veracity of those ments of Penn's city causing him to shuffle along as if travellers and scandalizers who had set down the worthy he was walking on ice. But in this day of flag-stones Gothamites as "men of mighty noses," when admiraand asphalt, this distinction no longer exists, and New-ble to relate—wonderful to tell! a man passed my winYork is without a physiognomy: and for the next half dow with a nose-such a NOSE! On it was plainly incentury to come, the immense emigrant population of scribed in large Roman capitals, this city must continue to invest it with its present peculiarities. "HIC EST AUT NUSQUAM QUOD QUŒRIS?" "Here and no where else, indeed, is what I seek," I Ostensibly the English language is spoken here; but exclaimed, seizing my hat and stick. But the next moreally German or High and Low Dutch, or, else a broken ment the thought occurred to me that perhaps he was a superstructure of English upon a German basis are as stranger-and my heart sunk within me. But I inward. commonly heard by the passer-by in many of the streetsly resolved the vexed point should be decided and for that ramify from Broadway, as French is in New Orleans. ever put to rest by this nose, for to whatsoever city it In every sense of the word, New York, if it can be char- should be proved to belong, it would mark that city to acterised at all, must still, as in the days of Governor the exclusion of all others. I sallied forth in pursuit. only occupants. He with the nose appeared behind It did not rain-it poured! The sun had not been visi-the counter, and bending over it with much grace, po ble for a fortnight. The streets were buried as deep beneath a superstructure of mud and water, as ever was Herculaneum. Every man carried an umbrella. The chase was half a square ahead of me, and going at full speed. "This," thought I, "is in favor of his being a Gothamite-for they never walk but rush along the streets." And herein he was a New Yorker: for he 'scurried' along the pavé like a penny-post man. Skilfully he evaded the sea of umbrellas that rolled and waved about his head. By this I knew he was not from the country -what city then was to claim him! I was determined to know. He had to cross the street-but, although evidently in great haste, he went thirty steps out of his way to take the flags by a right angle. He must be a New Yorker, was my mental ejaculation. He neither lingered to gaze at any thing or any body-all that he passed seemed too familiar to his eye to attract his attention. "Alas, for Gotham!" I said. He bowed with a jerk of the head to several whom he met, just as a man does to acquaintances he is in the habit of seeing daily. "Gotham, thou art the city that owns this man!" thus thought I. He turned down Wall Street, and as he got opposite No. 8, he stopped and looked in as if about to mount the steps and enter, when with a negative shake of his head he continued down at the same rate as before. This delay had enabled me to come up to within twenty feet of him. What surprised me, and at the same time made me almost certain that he was a Gothamite was, that his vast nose attracted no attention-no one turned to look after him-no one stared as he went by-no little boys shouted Nosey!" I lost him near the board fence that encloses the Custom House, amid a rabble rout that were looking at caricatures stuck thereon. As I was anxiously searching after him a dirty nosed urchin thrust a newspaper beneath my nose and shrieked out "Sun'ny Mornin' Nose, sir?" litely desired to know my wishes. "He is the shop-keeper-therefore doubtless a Gothamite," thought I. "Can I help you to any thing to-day, sir?" he asked interrupting my thoughts. "Have you any nos gloves, I mean to say, sir!" "A superior article," he said, handing down several parcels. I selected a pair. "Bad weather, sir," I remarked, entering into a conversation preparatory to the grand aim I had in view-namely, to know what town gave him birth. "Extremely, sir." "You have a great deal of rain in New-York, I be lieve." "No, sir. Never a city showed such a full pattern of blue sky the year round-why, sir-we get three per cent less profit on our goods here than in Boston, the shops are all so light-so much sunshine. I wish it was more cloudy, and the days were darker, for my part-this bright weather is ruinous to our business." "No doubt, sir, no doubt. You have lived in New York many years, I presume, sir?” “Man and boy, and I may say baby too, for that matter-for I was born back here in Nassau street, I have lived here, and that's five and forty years come next Christmas. It's improved vastly in this time, sir. It's got to be a great and 'wonderful place now-the greatest I expect in the world next to London." "It's the greatest and most wonderful nose I ever saw!" said I, unconsciously repeating his epithets, and gazing abstractedly on that organ. "What, sir?" he asked, as if he had not heard my paraphrase. "I beg pardon, sir,-you were speaking of NewYork?" "Yes, sir-a great place." "It is a bad day," he said, handing me my change, "Do you see it?" I eagerly asked, my thoughts only I never saw the like before." on the nose, darting forward. "Cricky, but he's a rum 'un!" said the imp, as I left him picking up his papers which in my haste I had jostled from his hand. I soon discovered the nose. The nose which was destined to dicide the fate of cities! He doubled the corner of Wall and William Streets. I was close at his heels! Suddenly he stopped before a store door, sprung and shut his umbrella, opened the door like one familiar with the premises and disappeared. Here now had arrived the moment and opportunity of for ever putting at rest this question of noses. For in my own private opinion that nose would turn the scale, for or against any city, this or the other side of the ocean. With a step weighty and solemn with the importance of my business, I lifted the latch and entering the shop I cast my eyes anxiously round. The gentleman with the nose and two little boys with pug smellers were the "Nor I!" I replied, looking significantly and wick. edly at his nose. "Good day, sir!" "Good day, sir." Since I have heard the question of noses discussed at the table d' hote; but I have held my tongue and husbanded my own wisdom. A WOUNDED SPIRIT. THERE is no rest for those who roam, To them the charm that made appear Original. THE CHRISTIANS. A PASSAGE FROM THE REIGN OF NERO. BY EDWARD MATURIN. "They were put to death with exquisite cruelty, and to their sufferings Nero added mockery and derision."-ANNALS OF TACITUS. CHAPTER 1.-THE CONSPIRATORS. In a small apartment, strongly guarded by some of their own adherents, sat a small band of those, whom detestation of the tyrant and designs for vengeance had combined in a common cause. Humanity shuddered at the atrocities, perpetrated in the moments of whim and levity, and the minds of virtuous men were not less revolted at the crimes than the character of an Emperor whose chief delight was the blood of his people. Contempt formed also no slight ingredient in their revenge. A monarch who compromised the dignity of his throne for the humble distinctions of "a coachman and comedian," and who in his own person degraded the majesty of the empire he represented, by collision with the lowest classes, had claim neither to the respect nor allegiance of his subjects. Their reins of government were each day relaxed in authority, when its chief magistrate degenerated into a mere night brawler, masked for the purpose of enjoying his debauchery and excess with impunity. Yet there were many who fiattered the vices of the tyrant, and dignified his follies with the name of talent, because they dreaded his frown; nor even did the Senate hesitate to pass decrees of servile adulation, extolling a son for the murder of his own mother, and proclaiming the anniversary of her birth-day as unhallowed in the calendar. But in that corrupt body there was one left (Pætus Thrasea) in whom the sense of virtue and natural feeling was sufficiently strong to restrain praise on such an occasion; and whose independence, in abandoning his seat, only marked him for the future vengeance of the Emperor, and formed an ingredient in his subsequent accusation. || "The conspirators," says Tacitus, "painted forth in glowing colors all his atrocious deeds, by which the Empire was brought to the brink of ruin; they urged the necessity of choosing a successor equal to the task of restoring a distressed and tottering state." The Author of the present conspiracy was Caius Piso, whose noble birth derived additional lustre from his talents, which were uniformly employed in behalf of his suffering country. ious to arrogate to himself the glory of a deed which would end the sufferings and degradation of his country. "Why should we not," exclaimed Subrius Flavius, "strike the tyrant and avenge the honor of our country at the very moment he insults it? Even while in the garb of a comedian he courts the applause of his people-a blow struck at such a period will disclose its own motive." 'Were it not better," said another, " that he should fall in his midnight frolics; to fire the palace, and in the confusion dispatch him ?" The acquiescence in the last design was unanimous. There was only one objection to it: the safety to themselves, which must accompany its completion. As men sworn to the arduous enterprise of rescuing their country, they were willing to hazard their lives, and deemed the cause consecrated by the very dangers to which it exposed them. "No!" exclaimed Piso, "let the blow be struck before the assembled people. Let them see, though they may patiently wear the chains a player has laid on them, that Rome has not forgotten her Brutus, and that his spirit has not ended with his age. Flavius hath spoken rightly-the moment of his fall should be while he insults his country and degrades the purple; let us also regard the majesty of the throne, insulted by the abandoned appetites of its prince, and stained with the blood of matricide. We have regarded his cruelties with too much indifference, and his vices with too much pardon; but it is time the sword should be unsheathed against himself, and those very vices be made the instruments of his death. Let us not wanton with the time in meditation, which should be devoted to action. A purpose like ours may cool by delay, and needs to be kindled by promptitude and decision. Each new day discloses a murder perpetrated in the moment of whim, or midnight revelry. Poetry and philosophy wither in the poisonous atmosphere of his throne, and the deaths of a Seneca and Lucan may yet be necessary to propitiate the monster, and appease his thirst for blood. But when he is insensible to the ties of nature, why should he feel the influence of those more distant? Perhaps even now while we deliberate, the fate of some one of us may hang in the scale, and his name may already stand on the roll of proscription." As Piso concluded, every hand more closely clasped its hilt, while the frown and the compressed lip, denoted the sternness of resolve. A general murmur of approbation ran through the conspirators, which subsided At the head of the table, surrounded by several Ro- in the sentiments which it originated. Like men intent man knights, stood Piso; and on his right-hand, Fenius upon the same end, each proposed a different means Rufus, commander of the Prætorian Guards, whose in- for its accomplishment. Some, in whom the sense of tegrity as a public officer had insured the respect of the personal safety predominated, advocated private assasarmy and people. A single lamp illuminated the apart- sination; while others, by the publicity of the act, exment, whose dim light gave an air of sternness to the hibited their utter recklessness of life in the vengeance visages of the group. Aware of the dangerous occa- which was sure to follow. The more pusillanimous sion for which they were assembled, and the vengeance proposed not only that the blow should be dealt by which awaited them in case of discovy, each man Piso's hand; but even during the hour of hospitality. stood with his sword drawn. Amid the various designs But the heart of the conspirator was not so blunted to proposed for the downfall of the tyrant, each was anx-honorable principle as to accede to that proposal. "What!" he exclaimed, "stain my household gods | Olympian, would scatter its rays of worship on many; and dishonor my table with the blood of my prince! while ours concentrates its light on One. Thinkest thou, No; those who strike for their country, should do it in maiden, this teeming earth, and yon glorious sky, are the full gaze of her children. If we fall in the attempt, the works of a Being fashioned and material as our. we fall not like cowards, afraid to proclaim their act, selves, the slave of passions, He affects to control in but before the gaze of thousands who shall fire their others, with whom the Disobedient hath no hope save children with the tale." vengeance, and the Virtuous no enjoyment save the passing hour of life?" Immediately opposite to Piso, stood a man who had hitherto remained in silence; his arms were crossed on 'Nay," rejoined Tita, "our faith limits not enjoyhis breast, and one hand was concealed within the fold ment to life. Elysium opens her gates to the happy, of his robe. From the tenor of his life, hitherto disso-where wander the poets and sages, whose verses and lute and effeminate, but little valor or stability of pur- precepts have been the land-marks of their age." pose was anticipated by his confederates. His features delicately moulded, and habitually mild in their expression, gave but slight indication of the resolution or hostility of a conspirator. What was their astonishment when the soft and voluptuous Scevinus plucked from his bosom a dagger, claiming the honor and danger of the blow. "And what," said the Christian, "can even the poet create in that Elysium to compare with the Eternity our God hath revealed to us? The poet will still rehearse his song, and the warrior repeat the story of his fight. Though the outward form of nature shall be changed, the low and perishable objects they have left on earth, shall yet be the theme of every tongue, and the desire "Romans!" he exclaimed, “look on this dagger!-of every heart. The Gods thou trustest in, whom thou 'tis sworn to liberty! I wear it for a tyrant. I have taken it from the Temple of Fortune, and invoked the blessing of that goddess on our enterprise. For liberty I wear it, and none shall forestall me in the blow. For me, I care not if I fall, but let the eyes of Rome be on me. Let the place then be the Circus, while he celebrates the games of Ceres. Let the hour of festivity be that of death, and the groans of the dying be echoed by the exulting shouts of his people. I have carried this weapon on my person consecrated to freedom, and have sworn not to part with it, till the task be accomplished." hast worshipped as eternal, desert thee on the brink of the future, and leave thee to wander amid the darkness of the Stygian shore. Canst thou worship beings who doom thee to expiate the crimes themselves have committed; who have never enjoined a single law for the guidance of thy life, and yet punish thee for violation? Now look, my Tita, to the eternity of the Christian : the heaven I have told thee of is the dwelling-place of our God; and joys, such as the ear hath not heard, nor the eye seen, are the reward of those who in the steadfastness of faith forsake all for the love they bear Him. Emancipated from the body, our souls are purified from the lusts which bound us to life, and our senses cleans There was a dead silence throughout the assembly, as they gazed, not more in admiration than wonder, ated for the enjoyments of a more perfect state. The the change which circumstance had wrought in the disposition of the voluptuary. Scevinus advanced to the centre of the apartment, and motioned the conspirators to his side. They surrounded him. He pressed the dagger to his lips, each following his example; and as he consecrated it to "Jupiter Vindex," each touchedown heaven." the hilt, and bound himself to "Death or Freedom!" CHAPTER II. THE CHRISTIANS. "And is it true, my Claudius, as thou hast told me, that there is but one God?" · Even so, Tita-a God who regards thee with the love of a father. A God, who, in his own being, embraces the power which thy faith hath divided among many. One, perfect as he is powerful, who looks on human sin only to forgive; whose altars stream not with the blood of beasts, but whose only sacrifice is the incense of a pure and contrite heart." "Yet," continued the maiden, fearful to abandon her early faith, and almost persuaded to be a Christian, "hath not that faith a loftier beauty, which shows us a presiding power in all things, and diffuses the glory of Divinity through every object, whether it be the soft and sunshine stream, or the flower that grows upon its band?" "Even so, my Tita, every object hath a God to thee. Thy faith, like the halo which circles the brow of thy saints who have worshipped here in faith, and the martyrs whose deaths have attested the truth of that faith, will form that glorious company of angels, whose harps shall hymn the praises of their God, and whose crowns of immortality beam as brightly as the stars of their 66 "And is this change to all?" inquired Tita. "To those who believe," rejoined the Christian, 'even as I have told thee, in the words of our God,All things are possible to those who believe.' What can give us patience amid the scoffs, and courage amid the dangers which beset us--but that faith, which, like a ray can penetrate the cloud, and reveal the bright heaven which awaits us? An Enemy to our faith is on the throne, and while he persecutes, derides the tortures he inflicts. But the Christian can smile on the pains inflicted by an earthly hand, when he remembers they touch but the body, but cannot approach the soul. They are like the thorns which bound the brow of his Saviour, but could not quench the halo whose light was immortal. Such is the hope of the Christian; amid trials and sorrows he is supported by the sense that they endure but for a season, and that the hand that persecutes is as mortal as the victim." "I tremble for the wrath of Jupiter," said the maiden, timidly, "should I abandon his altar." "And wilt thou," replied Claudius, "continue in the |