Re-echoed they swell From the rock on the hill; They sing their farewell, And the music is still. TO SENECA LAKE. On thy fair bosom, silver lake! The wild swan spreads his snowy sail, As blows the north-wind, heave their foam; And curl around the dashing oar, As late the boatman hies him home. How sweet, at set of sun, to view Thy golden mirror spreading wide, And see the mist of mantling blue Float round the distant mountain's side. At midnight hour, as shines the moon, On thy fair bosom, silver lake! O! I could ever sweep the oar, When early birds at morning wake, And evening tells us toil is o'er. THE GRAVES OF THE PATRIOTS. Here rest the great and good. Here they repose Their greatness. It is round them; and the joy With which their children tread the hallowed ground That holds their venerated bones, the peace mute As feeling ever is when deepest,-these Touch not the ancient elms, that bend their shade Over their lowly graves; beneath their boughs No column pointing to the heaven they sought, For words or tears-here let us strew the sod DANIEL PIERCE THOMPSON, THE historical novelist of Vermont, was born at Charlestown, Massachusetts, October 1, 1795. His grandfather, Daniel Thompson, of Woburn, a cousin of the well known Count Rumford, fell in the battle of Lexington. His mother was a descendant of the old primitive New England schoolmaster, Ezekiel Cheever. His father settled for awhile in business at Charlestown, but being unsuccessful withdrew to a wild farm of a few acres on Onion River in the town of Berlin, Vermont, which he had some time before purchased of one Lovel, a hunter, and son of the noted Indian fighter, the hero of Lovel's Pond in Fryburgh, Maine. Here the family lived a pioneer life in the wilderness, remote from schools and churches; if indeed the latter were not supplied in the Christian piety and devout religious exercises of the mother of the household, to the memory of whose virtues and instructions the heart of her son fondly turns. The youth was brought up in the labors of the farm, securing such elementary instruction us his home and a scanty winter attendance at the poor district school afforded. He was sighing for books to read when he was then about sixteenat the breaking up of the roads and ice in the spring, after an extraordinary freshet, which brought together the wrecks of bridges, mills, and trees, he found among the remains a thoroughly soaked volume. He dried the leaves, and with great zest read, for the first time, the verses of the English poets. The passages which he then admired he afterwards found to be the favorite passages of the world, "a fact," he has remarked, "which taught him a lesson of respect for the opinions of the uncultivated, by which he has often profited." He was now intent on procuring an education. It is difficult, in the matured state of society of the present day, with the appliances of education extended so freely on all sides, to estimate the natural strength of mind, and personal efforts and sacrifices, which led many a farmer's son half a century ago to the gates of the New England colleges. Daniel Webster rejoicing on his way to Dartmouth, and afterwards supporting his brother there by teaching, will recur to everyone. The young Thompson, on looking around for resources, found that he was master of a small flock of sheep, which had come to be his under rather singular circumstances. When the family had set out for the wilderness his grandmother had put into his hand, in his childhood, a silver dollar which was to be invested in a ewe, the good lady calculating that the future growth of the flock, well tended, might in some way be of important service to him. He was now the owner, in consequence, of sixteen sheep. By a long process of inquiry he came to the knowledge that he could purchase, for their value in the market, a pair of two year old steers, which he might support in the summer in the woods free of cost, and by hiring raise to full grown oxen in a couple of years, when his sheep fund would be doubled. The money to be realized would help to support him in college. On this agricultural basis he began his preparations; diligently hunting mink and muskrat, the skins of which were saleable. He worked out with an old blacksmith the cost of a set of steel traps, and with the proceeds made the purchase of that rare book in Vermont at the time, Pike's large arithmetic, also a Latin grammar, lexicon, and Virgil. He was now in difiiculty with the pronunciation of the latter, but he secured that from a graduate of Dartmouth, who had settled as a lawyer in a village growing up in his neighborhood, paying him, per contract, thirtyseven and a-half cents for three lessons in the language, which, with his own exertions, carried him through the grammar. Released by his father from his labor on the farm-an important consideration in that place and time-and having disposed of his cattle for seventy five dollars and a thick old-fashioned bull's-eye watch, which he thought might be of service to him in marking the hours in his contemplated school-keeping; and being fitted by his mother with an equipment of homespun wardrobe, he turned his steps one morning of September, 1815, to the house of a clergyman thirty miles off, who kept one or two pupils at a time in preparation for college. He here made such good use of his opportunities that in twelve weeks he had read the whole of Virgil; the winter he employed in studying human nature and adding to his means while boarding round as the schoolmaster of one of the wild districts of the country. A good preparation, he subsequently found it, for novel writing. A short time at a classical academy in the north-west of the state for his own studies, more school-keeping, with an interval of conscientious help rendered to his father in the severe toil of the farm, and he presented himself at Middlebury College. He passed the examination for the Sophomore class, studied hard and read extensively with close attention to English composition, and took his degree in the summer of 1820. Through the friendship of Professor Keith of Alexandria, D. C., he now obtained an eligible private tutorship in a family in Virginia, in the vicinity of the mansions of the old Ex-Presidents, and so far profited by his opportunities as to procure an admission as attorney and counsellor of the inferior and superior courts of the state. After three or four years of this pleasant life he returned home and opened a law-office in Montpelier. He soon got the appointment of Register of Probate, was elected clerk of the legislature, which he held for three years, when he passed a year, on the appointment of the Governor, in compiling a volume of the statute laws. He has been since Judge of Probate of the county, County Clerk of the county and Supreme Court, and in 1853 he. was elected Secretary of State. Mr. Thompson's active pursuit of literature was somewhat accidental. He had from his college DJ Thompson years contributed to periodicals tales and essays, but had written nothing of length till in 1835, upon noticing an offer for a prize tale by the New England Galaxy, published at Boston, he wrote his story of May Martin, or the Money Diggers; which, having gained the prize, proved so successful, that when he published it in a volume he was not able to hold the copyright from rival booksellers, who printed it with impunity, from the unprotected pages of the newspaper. This well told story was founded on incidents of actual occurrence in his neighborhood, with which he had become acquainted in the course of his professional business. In 1840 Mr. Thompson published at Montpelier, The Green Mountain Boys, "intended to embody and illustrate a portion of the more romantic incidents which actually occurred in the early settlements of Vermont, with the use of but little more of fiction than was deemed sufficient to weave them together, and impart to the tissue a connected interest." Locke Amsden, or the Schoolmaster, followed in 1847. This work, the design of which is to illustrate the art of intellectual selfculture, and to serve the interests of popular education, involves no inconsiderable part of the author's autobiography, and is drawn largely from his personal observation. It is an interesting picture of a time already ancient-so rapidly has the cause of education developed itself in what was not many years since a scanty wild settlement. The Rangers, or the Tory's Daughter, a counterpart to the Green Mountain Boys, was published in 1850. It is illustrative of the Revolutionary history of Vermont, and the northern campaigns of 1777; and is the result of a careful study of the time to which the author has made fiction subservient. The style in this, as in the preceding, is full and minute, the writer knowing the art of the story-teller, who must leave nothing for the mind of the listener outside of the narrative, but must engross the whole interest for himself and his tale. This concludes the list of the author's works. They form a series which has attained high popularity in his state, and which has travelled far beyond it. The tales have been republished in England, where they have doubtless been read with interest as pictures of American history and society. The manly career of the author, resulting in his honorable success in life, and the interest of his books, have secured him a sterling popularity at home. He married in 1831 a daughter of E. K. Robinson of Chester, Vermont, and is surrounded by a family of children. A SCHOOL COMMITTEE-MAN AND A LAWSUIT. [Locke Amsden is in pursuit of a country engagement as a school teacher.] The little knowledge he had gained, Was all from simple nature drained.-GAY. It was late in the season when our hero returned home; and having inadvertently omitted to apprise his friends of his intention to engage himself as a teacher of some of the winter schools in the vicinity of his father's residence, he found, on his arrival, every situation to which his undoubted qualifications should prompt him to aspire, already occupied by others. He was therefore compelled, unless he relinquished his purpose, to listen to the less eligible offers which came from such smaller and more backward districts or societies as had not engaged their One of these he was on instructors for the winter. the point of deciding to accept, when he received information of a district where the master, from some cause or other, hal been dismissed during the first week of his engagement, and where the committee were now in search of another to supply his place. The district from which this i formation came, was situated in one of the mountain towns about a dozen miles distant, and the particular neighborhood of its location was known in the vicinity, to a considerable extent, by the name of the Horn of the Moon; an appellation generally understood to be derived from a peculiar curvature of a mountain that partially enclosed the place. Knowing nothing of the causes which had here led to the recent dismissal of the teacher, nor indee 1 of the particular character of the school, further than that it was a large one, and one, probably, which, though in rather a new part of the country, would yet furnish something like an adequate remuneration to a good instructor, Locke had no hesitation in deciding to make an immediate application for the situation. Accordingly, the next morning he mounted a horse, and set out for the place in question. It was a mild December's day; the ground had not yet assumed its winter covering, and the route taken by our hero becoming soon bordered on either side by wild and picturesque mountain scenery, upon which he had ever delighted To look from nature up to nature's God, And octhe excursion in going was a pleasant one. cupiel by the reflections thus occasioned, together with anticipations of happy results from his expected engagement, he arrived after a ride of a few hours, at the borders of the romantic looking place of which he was in quest. 64 66 At this point in his journey, he overtook a man on foot, of whom, after discovering him to belong somewhere in the neighborhool, he proceeded to make some inquiries relative to the situation of the school. Why," replied the man, as I live out there in the tip of the Horn, which is, of course, at the outer edge of the district, I know but little about the school affairs; but one thing is certain, they have shipped the master, and want to get a other, I suppose." For what cause was the master dismissed? For lack of qualifications?" Yes, lack of qualifications for our district. The fellow, however, had learning enough, as all agreed, but no spunk; and the young Bunkers, and some O yes at least I had as lief have Bill Bunker's judgment of a man who applied for the school as any other in the district; and yet he is the only man in the whole district but what can read and write, I believe." "Your school committee not able to read and write?" 'Not a word, and still he does more business than any man in this neighborhood. Why, sir, he keeps a sort of store, sells to A, B, and C, and charges on book in a fashion of his own; and I would as soon trust to his book as that of any regular merchant in the country; though, to be sure, he has got into a jumble, I hear, about some charges against a man at t'other end of the Horn, and they are having a court about it to-day at Bunker's house, I understand.” Where does he live?" 66 66 Right on the road, about a mile ahead. You will see his name chalked on a sort of a shop-looking building, which he uses for a store.” The man here turned off from the road, leaving our hero so much surprised and staggered at what he had just heard, not only of the general character of the school of which he had come to propose himself as a teacher, but of the man who now had the control of it, that he drew up the reins, stopped his horse in the road, and sat hesitating some moments whether he would go back or forward. It occurring to him, however, that he could do as he liked about accepting any offer of the place which might be made him, and feeling, moreover, some curiosity to see how a man who could neither read nor write would manage in capacity of an examining school committee, he resolved to go forward, and present himself as a candidate for the school. Accordingly, he rode on, and soon reached a rough built, but substantial-looking farm-house, with sundry out-buildings, on one of which he read, as he had been told he might, the name of the singular occupant. In the last-named building, he at once perceived that there was a gathering of quite a number of individuals, the nature of which was explained to him by the hint he had received from his informant on the road. tying his horse, he joined several who were going in, and soon found himself in the midst of the company assembled in the low, unfinished room which constituted the interior, as parties, witnesses, and spectators of a justice's court, the ceremonies of which were about to be commenced. There were no counters, counting-room, or desk; and a few broad shelves, clumsily put up on one side, afforded the only indication, observable in the interior arrangement of the And room, of the use to which it was devoted. On these shelves were scattered, at intervals, small bunches of hoes, axes, bed-cords, and such articles as are generally purchased by those who purchase little; while casks of nails, grindstones, quintals of dried salt fish, and the like, arranged round the room on the floor, made up the rest of the owner's merchandise, an annual supply of which, it appeared, he obtained in the cities every winter in exchange for the products of his farm; ever careful, like a good political economist, that the balance of trade should not be against him. The only table and chair in the room were now occupied by the justice; the heads of casks, grindstones, or bunches of rakes, answering for seats for the rest of the company. On the left of the justice sat the defendant, whose composed look, and occasional knowing smile, seemed to indicate his confidence in the strength of his defence as well as a consciousness of possessing some secret advantage over his opponent. On the other hand sat Bunker, the plaintiff in the suit. Ascertaining from the remarks of the bystanders his identity with the committee-man he had become so curious to see, Locke fell to noting his appearance closely, and the result was, upon the whole, a highly favorable prepossession. He was a remarkably stout, hardy-looking man; and although his features were extremely rough and swarthy, they yet combined to give him an open, honest, and very intelligent countenance. Behind him, as backers, were standing in a group three or four of his sons, of ages varying from fifteen to twenty, and of bodily proportions promising anythi: g but disparagement to the Herculean stock from which they originated. The parties were now called and sworn; when Bunker, there being no attorneys employed to make two-hour speeches on preliminary questions, proceeded at once to the merits of his case. He produced and spread open his account-book, and then went on to show his manner of charging, which was wholly by hieroglyphies, generally designating the debtor by picturi g him out at the top of the page with some peculiarity of his person or calling. In the present case, the debtor, who was a cooper, was designated by the rude picture of a man in the act of hoopi: g a barrel; and the article charged, there being but one item in the account, was placed immediately beneath, and represented by a shaded, circular figure, which the plaintiff said was intended for a cheese, that had been sold to the defendant some years before. “Now, Mr. Justice,” said Bunker, after explaining in a direct, off-hand manner, his peculiar method of book-keeping, now, the article here charged the man had-I will, and do swear to it; for here it is in black and white. And I having demanded my pay, and he having not only refused it, but denied ever buying the article in question, I have brought this suit to recover my just due. And now I wish to see if he will get up here in court, and deny the charge under oath. If he will, let him; but may the Lord have mercy on his soul!" "Well, sir," replied the defendant, promptly rising, "you shall not be kept from having your wish a minute; for I here, under oath, do swear, that I never bought or had a cheese of you in my life." Under the oath of God you declare it, do you?" sharply asked Bunker. "I do, sir," firmly answered the other. "Well, well!" exclaimed the former, with looks of utter astonishment, "I would not have believed that there was a man in all of the Horn of the Moon who would dare to do that." After the parties had been indulged in the usual amount of sparring for such occasions, the justice interposed and suggested, that as the oaths of the par ties were at complete issue, the evidence of the book itself, which he seemed to think was entitled to credit, would turn the scale in favor of the plaintiff, unless the defendant could produce some rebutting testimony. Upon this hint, the latter called up two of his neighbors, who testified in his behalf, that he himself always made a sufficient supply of cheese for his family; and they were further knowing, that, on the year of the alleged purchase, instead of buying, he actually sold a considerable quantity of the ar ticle. This evidence seemed to settle the question in the mind of the justice; and he now soon announced, that he felt bound to give judgment to the defendant for his costs. Judged and sworn out of the whole of it, as I am a sinner!" cried the disconcerted Bunker, after sitting a moment working his rough features in indignant surprise; "yes, fairly sworn out of it, and saddled with a bill of costs to boot! But I can pay it; so reckon it up, Mr. Justice, and we will have it all squared on the spot. And, on the whole, I am not so sure but a dollar or two is well spent, at any time, in finding out a fellow to be a scoundrel who has been passing himself off among people for an honest man," he added, pulling out his purse, and angrily dashing the required amount down upon the table. "Now, Bill Bunker," said the defendant, after very coolly pocketing his costs, "you have flung out a good deal of your stuff here, and I have bore it without getting riled a hair; for I saw, all the time, that you correct as folks ginerally think you-that you didn't know what you was about. But now it's all fixed and settled, I am going jist to convince you that I am not quite the one that has sworn to a perjury in this 'ere business." Well, we will see," rejoined Bunker, eyeing his opponent with a look of mingled doubt and defiance. "Yes, we will see," responded the other, determinedly; "we will see if we can't make you eat your own words. But I want first to tell you where you missed it. When you dunned me, Bunker, for the pay for a cheese, and I said I never had one of you, you went off a little too quick; you called me a liar, before giving me a chance to say another word. And then, I thought I would let you take your own course, till you took that name back. If you had held on a minute, without breaking out so upon me, I should have teld you all how it was, and you would have got your pay on the spot; but " Pay!" fiercely interrupted Bunker, “then you admit you had the cheese, do you?" "No, sir, I admit no such thing," quickly rejoined the former; "for I still say I never had a cheese of you in the world. But I did have a small grindstone of you at the time, and at just the price you have charged for your supposed cheese; and here is your money for it, sir. Now, Bunker, what do you say to that?" "Grindstone-cheese-cheese-grindstone!" exclaimed the now evidently nonplussed and doubtful Bunker, taking a few rapid turns about the room, and occasionally stopping at the table to scrutinize anew his hieroglyphical charge; I must think this matter over again. Grindstone-cheese-cheesegrindstone. Ah! I have it; but may God forgive me for what I have done! It was a grindstone, but I forgot to make a hole in the middle for the crank." Upon this curious development, as will be readily imagined, the opposing parties were not long in effecting an amicable and satisfactory adjustment. And, in a short time, the company broke up and departed, all obviously as much gratified as amused at this singular but happy result of the lawsuit. WILLIAM B. SPRAGUE. THE Rev. Dr. Sprague was born in Andover, Connecticut, October 16, 1795. His father, Benjamin Sprague, a farmer, lived and died on the spot where he was born. The son was fitted for college at Colchester Academy under the venerable John Adams, and was much indebted in his education to the Rev. Dr. Abiel Abbot, now of Peterboro', N. H., then the Congregational Minister of Coventry, Connecticut. He was graduated at Yale in 1815, and then employed for nearly a year as a private tutor to a family in Virginia. He entered the Theological Seminary at Princeton in the autumn of 1816, and remained till the spring of 1819; was settled as colleague pastor with the Rev. Dr. Joseph Lathrop of the First Congregational Church in West Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1819; remained there ten years, and became settled as pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church in Albany in 1829, of which he is still (in 1854) the incumbent. WBShengue. The long list of the writings of Dr. Sprague commences with an Installation Sermon in 1820, and several discourses on special occasions in the following year. In 1822 he published his Letters to a Daughter, a favorite didactic volume, republished in Scotland, and latterly printed in this country with the title Daughter's Own Book. His Letters from Europe appeared in 1828. In 1838 he published a life of Dr. E. D. Griffin, President of Williams College, and, in 1815, the life of Timothy Dwight, in "Sparks's American Biography." His other volumes are of a practical devotional character, as his Lectures on Revivals of Religion (1832); Hints on Christian Intercourse (1834); Contrast between True and False Religion (1837); Aids to Early Religion (1847); and Words to a Young Man's Conscience (1848). Besides these, he has written numerous introductions to biographical and other works, and is the author of more than one hundred published pamphlets. The latter are of a religious character, sermons in the direct line of his profession, and occasional discourses and addresses on educational, social, and other topics. Of these we may enumerate those of an historical and biographical character, as the Funeral Sermon of Dr. Joseph Lathrop, in 1821; a Thanksgiving Historical Discourse at West Springfield, in 1824; a Fourth of July Discourse at Northampton, in 1827; a sermon at Albany, in behalf of the Polish Exiles, in 1834; an oration commemorative of La Fayette, at Albany, in the same year; a Phi Beta Kappa address before the Society of Yale, in 1843; an address before the Philomathesian Society of Middlebury College, in 1844; an historical discourse in 1846, containing notices of the Second Presbyterian Church and Congregation at Albany, during thirty years from the period of their organization; other discourses commemorative of Dr. Chalmers, in 1847; of the Hon. Silas Wright, the same year; of the Hon. Ambrose Spencer, late Chief-justice of the State of New York, the following year; and, with many others, a discourse, in 1850, on the late Samuel Miller of Princeton. The fondness of Dr. Sprague for biographical study is well known, and is illustrated by his large collection of autographs. With Dr. Tefft of Savannah, he enjoys the reputation of possessing the largest collection of this kind in the country. The latest publication of Dr. Sprague is a book of sketches of the personalties of foreign travel, entitled, Visits to European Celebrities. It includes notices, among others, of Edward Irving, Rowland Hill, Robert Hall, Neander, Chalmers, Wilson, and Southey. He is understood to have prepared for publication a biographical work, an account of the Clergy of America of all denominations, from the earliest times. JOHN P. KENNEDY. JOHN PENDLETON KENNEDY, the eldest son of a Baltimore merchant, was born in that city on the twenty-fifth of October, 1795, and was graduated at the College of Baltimore in 1812. In 1816 he was admitted to the bar, and was soon in successful practice. He was elected to the state House of Delegates in 1820, and in 1837 entered the House of Representatives. He was re-elected in 1841 and 1843, and in 1846 again became a member of the House of Delegates. He occupied a prominent position in Congress, as a leading member of the Whig party, and prepared the manifesto in which its representatives disclaimed any connexion with the administration of John Tyler. He was also the author of a volume entitled A Defence of the Whigs, published in 1844, and at an earlier period wrote with Warren Dutton of Massachusetts, and Charles Jared Ingersoll, of Pennsylvania, the address issued by the Protectionist Convention, held in New York in 1831.* In 1818 he commenced his purely literary career, by the publication in numbers, at the intervals of a fortnight, of The Red Book. It contained lively gossiping satire of contemporary social matters, by Kennedy, with poetry by his associate in the work, Peter Hoffinan Cruse, a native of Baltimore, who was afterwards the author of several able reviews and editor of the Baltimore American. Cruse died during the cholera summer of 1832, at the age of thirtyseven. The Red Book was continued during 1818 and 1819, until it formed two volumes. A long interval elapsed before Kennedy's next appearance as an author, Swallow Barn not having been published until 1832. This is a collection of sketches of rural life in Virginia, at the commencement of the present century, linked into a connected whole by a slight story. In 1835 Horse-Shoe Robinson appeared. The story was founded on the personal recollections of its hero, an old soldier of the Revolution, who derived his popular prænomen from the trade which he carried on before the war, of a blacksmith, and the practice of which he continued so far as hard blows were concerned, in the service of the country, in his native state of South Ca * Griswold's Prose Writers, p. 342. |