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"I could tell many a brave tale of the war," the Walton house remarked; "but my experience has been mainly of rich and costly halls and assemblies, held by the gayest and the most honored of the invader's chivalry and the wealthiest of their partizans. While you can all speak of cruel bloodshed, I can only tell of the sparkling wine which night after night flowed at my table. You can tell of patriot misery; I can only speak of tory magnificence. I fear that the proud and wealthy can glean no moral from me."

"Then be silent to-night," Old Trinity cried," for now we must let our thoughts tend to some useful purpose. Yet be not saddened at your banishment, for remember that in later times, the glad shout of peace was first echoed from your halls."

And the Walton House sunk into silence, mightily consoled for his exclusion by the reflection thus kindly offered.

Then Trinity continued:

"Are there no more who could benefit posterity by their experience? Are we indeed the sole poor remnants of a former age?

A faint whisper came floating through the air from the distant shrines of the East River. "Let me join your company," it said, "for few have seen more in their day than I."

"Listen! listen all!" Trinity spoke forth.

"It is the Kip's Bay House which speaks. Venerable in years and teeming with interesting recollections, naught which is uninstructive can come from it."

"As one of the oldest mansions on the whole island, my existence has been chequered in the extreme," said the Bay House. I was already old ere many of you were raised, and can remember how you were accounted rich ornaments to the growing city. Those times are sadly forgotten."

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Alas they are;" the rest doled forth.

"My revolutionary experience, like that of my brother Walton House, can add but little to the moral already drawn, for feasts and frolic mainly consumed the time. Yet the sad fate of Andre, who set out on his unfortunate expedition from me, with the toasts and good-wishes of all his brother officers, casts a deep gloom over these my brightest and most joyous recollections. Still, it is from my earlier years, when revolt was unheard of, and men paid their tribute and taxes with willing hands, that the

purse-proud citizen can draw instruction.

brother Stuyvesant ?"

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It is so," the Stuyvesant House answered. "You can remember much of note."

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Is it not so, my

"Then to you will I commit the task of commenting upon these earlier ages. In you, the greatest of Dutch Governers has lived and died. Surely your words cannot fail to be of interest." Why have you not spoken before?" St. Paul's inquired of the Stuyvesant House,

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which always loves better to But now, such a flood of recannot longer keep silence.

Truly, because of my old age, stand aloof and hear others speak. collections crowd upon me, that I You, who are of revolutionary note, can tell those who roll in wealth, that with all the magnificence and ease of this period, men are no better than of old; that in olden times, the frame was as stout and the mind as honest, the pulse as generous and the heart as free, as now: that then the fire of patriotism burnt full as brightly as it has since: and that, with all his poverty and simplicity, man was then as little lower than the angels as now. All this you can do."

"Yes."

"It is then yours to vindicate Revolutionary times from neglect. My brother of Kip's Bay, and I, must go farther back, and show the senselessness of the ridicule and reproach which some have attempted to cast upon our founders. A general impression has been produced, that the early Dutch, were a lethargic people, incapable of exerting or of cherishing any feelings of ambition. So that now, when their memory is recalled, the mind is immediately clouded with a confused vision of cocked hats and leather breeches, long waistcoats and short pipes, contented burghers and thrifty wives, until, little by little, it has come to be believed, that their whole business was to dress alike, and, sitting under the shade of wide-spread elms, smoke away their lives and cares together. All this gives an impression of laudable virtue, which the actual lives of our early citizens would well maintain, yet it is calculated to strip them of all that credit for hardy activity and persevering enterprise, to which their long years of toil have so justly entitled them. The numerous hunters and trappers who defiled through the wildernesses; the parties which yearly left

the safe neighborhood of New Amsterdam, and bravely settled themselves among tribes of savages who were either suspicious friends or unrelenting foes:-all there gave evidence of Colonial spirit, which should be recorded in a more generous manner than has yet been exhibited. Ah! would that we could for once speak to men and tell them our several stories!"

"Would that we could!" old Trinity responded. "But now we have but the sight of our time-worn walls, to point a moral.” "Even those will fail ere long," the Stuyvesant House replied. "How long do you thing it will be, ere many of us are levelled to the ground?"

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Are you a prophet among us, that you speak so?" said Trin

"He who judges from facts, does not prophesy," was the answer. "Is it prophesy to say, that the stone which is cast into the air, will return unto the ground?"

"Certainly not."

"Nor any more to say, that, when the walls begin to crack and the tower leans, and the mortar drops from the crevices, the building itself will ere long fall; or that, when a corporation once poor, becomes rich, it will no longer be content with the simple structure which served it in plainer times. This is your case, Trinity. Ere long you will be levelled, and a more magnificent structure will be raised in your place. But repine not. For, since you were built from days when simplicity was a fashion, dictated by honest poverty, and since you have thus outlived those times, your purpose has been amply fulfilled."

"And what shall be my fate?" asked St. Paul's.

"You may survive for many a year, for your walls are not yet weak and tottering, and you have been fashioned with those graces and adornments which serve to delight mankind. So you may be suffered to remain yet awhile. But to you, my Dutch and German friends, I cannot hold forth the same cheering predictions. You are all yet strong, and have all been endowed with some elegant appliances of art. But this may avail nothing. The tide of religion will gradually give place to that of business; desire for gain will prevent any observation of your several beauties; you will be looked upon with jealous speculative calculation; and soon, men will demand your fall, or will ask why property of such increasing value, should be allowed to remain devoted to the ser

vice of God, when mammon's eager appetite is yet unsatisfied. Alas! that too much can ever be sacrificed for religion!"

"And to what does my destiny tend?" the Old Jail inquired. "To speedy ruin, since man will not allow that to remain, which has neither beauty or usefulness. For you were built when architectural taste was uncultivated, and stout impregnable qualities, amply atoned for lack of external elegances. Neither can you now do proper services, for your walls cannot compass half the detected villany to be found in this increasing city. A more capacious habitation for guilt, will soon be erected, and you will be uprooted from your settled foundation."

"And I?" the Walton House, inquired.

"You may be suffered to remain, but not from regard to any associations or traditions connected with your name. Were it not that business could be prosecuted in your halls as well as masquerades were formerly, no hand would be stretched forth to save you from our common ruin. And now, my brother of Kip's Bay, tell what shall happen to us."

"What can happen but total and speedy destruction? Lo! even now our rotten timbers creak and shake in every passing gust of wind, and the rain pours freely through our worm-eaten roofs. And though we cannot sustain ourselves many years longer, yet happy shall we be if we are allowed to perish by such natural decay. For the great city is rapidly and surely marching on; daily its long lines gather nearer and nearer; soon it will commence to encompass us; and then the impatience of man will seal our doom, and the axe and the saw will finish what the wind and the rain were so long in performing. But cheer up, brothers, for have we not had our day of approbation? Have we not well performed our allotted services? And when we fall, although forgotten by many, will there not be some generous hearts who will mourn over our ruin? Then ring on a merry peal for the opening year, and, in the same strain, shout forth exulting joy, that new sights and sounds have not turned us from our proper allegiance to olden times."

The bells, which had been silent while the Stuyvesant and Bay Houses were speaking, paused yet a minute, and then were made to strike up a simultaneous chorus of joy. So loudly, so merrily gaily did they ring, that the again awakened sleeper, peered anx. iously forth from his window, the startled reveller let his glass fall

from his hand, and left the half uttered toast to remain unfinished, and the terrified watchman stood aloof, nor, with all the assurance of mingled prayers and curses, dared any longer pass below.

Hither and thither, up and down, to and fro, leaping and turning and twisting and writhing, until every old steeple shook and tottered, as though each succeeding peal would prostrate it to the ground, so did these bells bravely celebrate their owners' fixed adherence to youthful recollections.

One!

It was a bell of wondrous weight and power which struck the time. Workmen had toiled and panted and sweated as they watched it in the furnace, or day and night incessantly pounded on its hardened sides, with their heavy mallets. Journals had reported its progress in the foundry, and dilated ceaselessly upon its enormous size and cost. Curtis had listened with admiration to its thrilling far-sounding stroke, and pronounced it the prince of bells.

But with all this, it had no spirit! Faultless in size and weight and cost and beauty of tone, it was not the mouth-piece of any venerable old pile. No legends of ancient times were sent forth at its heavy stroke. It doled forth the hour-and that was all! One!

As men of true aristocratic refinement proudly retire from the presence of the blustering parvenu, so was the present field of conversation yielded to the clamorous intruder. Each other wheel and crank turned no more; each other iron tongue hung motionless in its circumference; and the old bells of Gotham sunk into silence, to commune together no more for ever.

SKETCH OF CHATEAUBRIAND.

THE Steamship "Hibernia," which arrived at an American port on the twenty-first day of the present month, brought the unwelcome intelligence of the death of Francis Augustus, Viscount of Chateaubriand,* Peer of France, and Member of the French Academy. The event took place on the fourth of this month, (July,) a day which, by the most singular coincidence in

* François Auguste, Viscomte de Chateaubriand.

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