But, let this compact be destroyed, and each state becomes instantaneously invested with absolute sovereignty. But what, I ask, will be the situation of these states (organized as they now are) if, by the dissolution of our national compact, they be left to themselves? What is the probable result? We shall either be the victims of foreign intrigue, and, split into factions, fall under the domination of a foreign power; or else, after the misery and torment of civil war, become the subjects of an usurping military despot. What but this compact-what but this specific part of it can save us from ruin? The judicial power, that fortress of the constitution, is now to be overturned.

Yes, with honest Ajax, I would not only throw a shield before it-I would build around it a wall of brass. But I am too weak to defend the rampart against the host of assailants. I must call to my assistance their good sense, their patriotism, and their virtue. Do not, gentlemen, suffer the rage of passion to drive reason from her seat. If this law be indeed bad, let us join to remedy the defects. Has it been passed in a manner which wounded your pride or roused your resentment? Have, I conjure you, the magnanimity to pardon that offence. I entreat, I implore you, to sacrifice these angry passions to the interests of our country. Pour out this pride of opinion on the altar of patriotism. Let it be an expiatory libation for the weal of America. Do not, for God's sake, do not suffer that pride to plunge us all into the abyss of ruin.

Îndeed, indeed, it will be but of little, very little avail, whether one opinion or the other be right or wrong: it will heal no wounds; it will pay no debts; it will rebuild no ravaged towns. Do not rely on that popular will which has brought us frail beings into political existence. That opinion is but a changeable thing. It will soon change. This very measure will change it. You will be deceived. Do not, I beseech you, in reliance on a foundation so frail, commit the dignity, the harmony, the existence of our nation to the wild wind. Trust not your treasure to the waves. Throw not your compass and your charts into the ocean. Do not believe that its billows will waft you into port. Indeed, indeed, you will be deceived. Oh! cast not away this only anchor of our safety. I have seen its progress. I know the difficulties through which it was obtained. I stand in the presence of Almighty God and of the world. I declare to you, that if you lose this charter, never,

no

never, will you get another! We are now, perhaps, arrived at the parting point. Here, even here we stand on the brink of fate. Pause! For heaven's sake

pause!

Pause!

THE CRUSADER.-Miss Landon.

He is come from the land of the sword and shrine,
From the sainted battles of Palestine ;

The snow-plumes wave o'er his victor crest-
Like a glory the red cross hangs at his breast;
The courser is black as black can be,

Save the brow-star, white as the foam of the sea.
And he wears a scarf of broidery rare,

The last love-gift of his lady fair:

It bore for device a cross and a dove,

And the words, 'I am vowed to my God and my love!' He comes not back the same that he went,

For his sword has been tried, and his strength has been

spent ;

His golden hair has a deeper brown,

And his brow has caught a darker frown,

And his lip has lost its boyish red,

And the shade of the south o'er his cheek is spread;

But stately his steps, and his bearing high,

And wild the light of his fiery eye,

And proud in the lists were the maiden bright

Who might claim the Knight of the Cross for her knight: But he rides for the home he has pined to see,

In the court, in the camp, in captivity.

He reached the castle-the gate was thrown
Open and wide, but he stood there alone:
He entered the door-his own step was all
That echoed within the deserted hall:
He stood on the roof of the ancient tower,
And for banner there waved one pale wall-flower;
And for sound of the trumpet and sound of the horn,
Came the scream of the owl on the night-wind borne:
And the turrets were falling, the vassals were flown,
And the bat ruled the halls he had thought his own.

His heart throbbed high; oh, never again
Might he soothe with sweet thoughts his spirit's pain!
He never might think on his boyish years,

Till his eyes grew dim with those sweet warm tears
Which hope and memory shed when they meet-
The grave of his kindred was at his feet.

He stood alone, the last of his race,

With the cold wide world for his dwelling-place:
The home of his fathers, gone to decay,
All but their memory was passed away;
No one to welcome, no one to share
The laurel he no more was proud to wear!
He came in the pride of his war-success
But to weep over very desolateness.
They pointed him to a barren plain,

Where his fathers, his brothers, his kinsmen, were slain;
They showed him the lowly grave, where slept

The maiden whose scarf he so truly had kept;
But they could not show him one living thing
To which his withered heart could cling.

Amid the warriors of Palestine
Is one, the first in the battle line;

It is not for glory he seeks the field,
For a blasted tree is upon his shield,

And the motto he bears is, 'I fight for a grave :'
He found it-that warrior has died with the brave

ECHOES.-Proctor.

YE Spirits like the winds!-ye who around
The rocks and these primeval mountains run,
With cries as though some thunder-god unbound
His wings, to celebrate the set of sun;
And, leaning from yon fiery cloud,
Alarming blew his brazen horn aloud,

And then with faint, and then with fainter voice,
That bade the world rejoice,

Proclaimed care asleep, and earthly labour done.

Oh! Spirits of the air and mountains born,
And cradled in the cave where Silence lies!

As from dusk night at once the tropic morn
Springeth upon the struck beholder's eyes
In mid-day power, bright and warm;
So ye, called forth from some unholy calm,
Mysterious, brooding, and prophetic, seem
To rise as from a dream,

And break your spell; but keep the secret of the charm.

Not only like the thunder and the blast

Are your high voices heard, for far away

Ye gently speak; and as, when life is past,

The white swan crowns with song her dying day;
So, in music, faint and sad

Ye perish, who, exultingly and glad
Rushed forward in your earlier course,
Like rivers from a rocky source,

Fast flashing into light, and sinking soon to shade.
Pale poets of the hills! doubtless ye are

Like those on earth, short-lived and self-consuming,
Yet bright, from lightnings which around your hair
Stream, and exhausted with too soon resuming
Your shouts, which first were stern and strong,
And bore the burden of your youth along,
But after, as ye further flew,

Grew slight, but ah! grew weaker too,

Until alone remained the memory of your song.

CLAIMS OF AFRICA.

Extract from a Speech delivered in Congress by Mr. Burges, of Rhode Island, May 10, 1830.

DURING the last century, a mighty revolution of mind has been made in the civilized world. Its effects are gradually disclosing themselves, and gradually improving the condition of the human race. The eyes of all nations are turned on these United States, for here that great

labour, sent out to them science, and arts and letters, laws and civilization.

Wars and revolutions have exhausted this ancient abundance, and spread ignorance and barbarism over her regions; and the cupidity of and aggravated these evils. not always be seen by man. out of his cloud, light fills the universe. What a mystery, when the youthful patriarch, lost to his father, was sold into slavery. What a display of wisdom and benignity, when we are permitted to see all the families of the earth blessed' by that event.

other nations has multiplied The ways of Providence canWhen the Almighty comes

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Shall we question the great arrangements of divine wisdom; or hold parlance with that power, who has made whole countries the enduring monuments of his avenging justice. Let these people go. They are citizens of another country send them home. Send them home instructed, and civilized, and imbued with the pure principles of Christianity; so may they instruct and civilize their native land, and spread over its wide regions the glad tidings of human redemption. Secure to your country, to your age, to yourselves, the glory of paying back to Africa the mighty arrears of nations. Add another New World to

the civilized regions of the globe.

Do not say your states will be depopulated; your fields left without culture. In countries equal in fertility, and under the same laws, you cannot create a void in population as well might you make a vacuum in the atmosphere. Better, more efficient labour, will come to your aid. Free men, observant of the same laws, cherishing the same union, worshipping the same God with you, will place themselves by your side. This change of moral and physical condition in our population, will follow the removal of that pernicious cause, now so productive of alarming difference in political opinion; jealousies, incident to our present state, shall give place to a glorious emulation of patriotism; and, O my country! if God so please, thou shalt be united, and prosperous, and perpetual.

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