agreeable. Availing myself of the obliging assistance of Mr. Arphaxad Bowers, an ingenious photographick artist, whose house-on-wheels has now stood for three years on our Meeting-House Green, with the somewhat contradictory inscription,

our motto is onward,' -I have sent accurate copies of my treasure to many learned men and societies, both native and European. I may hereafter communicate their different and (me judice) equally erroneous solutions. I solicit also, Messrs. Elitors, your own acceptance of the copy herewith enclosed. I need only premise further, that the stone itself is a goodly block of metamorphick sandstone, and that the Runes resemble very nearly the ornithichnites or fossil bird-tracks of Dr. Hitchcock, but with less regularity or apparent design than is displayed by those remarkable geological monuments. These are rather the non bene junctarum discordia semina rerum. Resolved to leave no door open to cavil, I first of all attempted the elucidation of this remarkable example of lithick literature by the ordinary modes, but with no adequate return for my labour. I then considered myself amply justified in resorting to that heroick treatment the felicity of which, as applied by the great Bentley to Milton, had long ago enlisted my admiration. In deed, I had already made up my mind, that, in case good fortune should throw any such invaluable record in my way, I would proceed with it in the following simple and satisfactory method. After a cursory examination, merely sufficing for an approximative estimate of its length, I would write down a hypothetical inscription based upon antecedent probabilities, and then proceed to extract from the characters engraven on the stone a meaning as nearly as possible conformed to this a priori product of my own ingenuity. The result more than justitie my hopes, inasmuch as the two inscriptions were made without any great violence to tally in all essential particulars. I then proceeded, not without some anxiety, to my second test, which was, to read the Runick letters diagonally, and again with the same success. With an excitement pardonable under the circumstances, yet tempered with thankful humility, I now applied my last and severest trial, my experimentum crucis. I turned the stone, now doubly precious in my eyes, with scrupulous exactness upside down. The physical exertion so far displaced my spectacles as to derange for a moment the focus of vision. I confess that it was with some tremulousness that I readjusted them upon my nose,

and prepared my mind to bear with calmness any disappointment that might ensue. But, O albo dies notanda lapillo! what was my delight to find that the change of position had effected none in the sense of the writing, even by so much as a single letter! I was now, and justly, as I think, satisfied of the conscientious exactness of my interpretation. It is as follows:

HERE

BJARNA GRIMOLFSSON FIRST DRANK CLOUD-BROTHER THROUGH CHILD-OF-LAND-AND

WATER:

that is, drew smoke through a reed stem. In other words, we have here a record of the first smoking of the herb Nicotiana Tabacum by an European on this continent. The probable results of this discovery are so vast as to baffle conjecture. If it be objected, that the smoking of a pipe would hardly justify the setting up of a memorial stone, I answer, that even now the Moquis Indian, ere he takes his first whiff, bows reverently toward the four quarters of the sky in succession, and that the loftiest monuments have been reared to perpetuate fame, which is the dream of the shadow of smoke. The Saga, it will be remembered, leaves this Bjarna to a fate something like that of Sir Humphrey Gilbert, on board a sinking ship in the 'wormy sea," having generously given up his place in the boat to a certain Icelander. It is doubly pleasant, therefore, to meet with this proof that the brave old man arrived safely in Vinland, and that his declining years were cheered by the respectful attentions of the dusky denizens of our then uninvaded forests. Most of all was I gratified, however, in thus linking forever the name of my native town with one of the most momentous occurrences of modern times. Jaalam, though in soil, climate, and geographical position as highly qualified to be the theatre of remarkable historical incidents as any spot on the earth's surface, has been, if I may say it without seeming to question the wisdom of Providence, almost maliciously neglected, as it might appear, by occurrences of world-wide interest in want of a situation. And in matters of this nature it must be confessed that adequate events are as necessary as the vates sacer to record them. Jaalam stood always modestly ready, but circumstances made no fitting response to her generous intentions. Now, however, she

Hitherto

Both 'll be jest ez sot in their ways ez a bagnet,

Ez otherwise-minded ez th' eends of a magnet,

An' folks like you 'n' me, thet ain't ept to be sold,

Git somehow or 'nother left out in the cold.

I expected 'fore this, 'thout no gret of a

row,

Jeff D. would ha' ben where A. Lincoln is now,

With Taney to say 't wuz all legle an' fair,

An' a jury o' Deemocrats ready to

swear

Thet the ingin o' State gut throwed into the ditch

By the fault o' the North in misplacin' the switch.

Things wuz ripenin' fust-rate with Buchanan to nuss 'em;

But the People they would n't be Mexicans, cuss 'em!

Ain't the safeguards o' freedom upsot, 'z you may say,

Ef the right o' rev'lution is took clean away?

An' doos n't the right primy-fashy include

The bein' entitled to nut be subdued?

The fact is, we 'd gone for the Union so strong,

When Union meant South ollus right an' North wrong,

Thet the people gut fooled into thinkin'

it might

Worry on middlin' wal with the North in the right.

We might ha' ben now jest ez prosp'rous ez France,

Where p'litikle enterprise hez a fair chance,

An' the people is heppy an' proud et this hour,

Long ez they hev the votes, to let Nap

hev the power;

But our folks they went an' believed wut we'd told 'em,

An', the flag once insulted, no mortle could hold 'em.

'T wuz pervokin' jest when we wuz cert'in to win,

An' I, for one, wun't trust the masses agin :

sion,

We wuz safely entrenched in the ole Constitootion,

With an outlyin', heavy-gun, casemated

fort

To rake all assailants, I mean th' S. J. Court.

Now I never 'll acknowledge (nut ef you should skin me)

't wuz wise to abandon sech works to the in'my,

An' let him fin' out thet wut scared him so long,

Our whole line of argyments, lookin' so strong,

All our Scriptur an' law, every the'ry an' fac',

Wuz Quaker-guns daubed with Proslavery black.

Why, of the Republicans ever should git

Andy Johnson or some one to lend 'em the wit

An' the spunk jes' to mount Constitootion an' Court

With Columbiad guns, your real eklerights sort,

Or drill out the spike from the ole Declaration

Thet can kerry a solid shot clearn roun' creation,

We'd better take maysures for shettin' up shop,

An' put off our stock by a vendoo or swop.

But they wun't never dare tu; you'll see 'em in Edom

'fore they ventur' to go where their doctrines 'ud lead 'em :

They've ben takin' our princerples up ez we dropt 'em,

An' it's wal understood thet we make a selection,

An' thet brotherhood kin' o' subsides arter 'lection.

The fust thing for sound politicians to larn is,

Thet Truth, to dror kindly in all sorts o' harness,

Mus' be kep' in the abstract, for, come to apply it,

You 're ept to hurt some folks's interists by it.

Wal, these 'ere Republicans (some on 'em) ects

Ez though gineral mexims 'ud suit speshle facts;

An' there's where we 'll nick 'em, there's where they'll be lost :

For applyin' your princerple 's wut makes it cost,

An' folks don't want Fourth o' July t' interfere

With the business-consarns o' the rest o'

Now I don't think the South 's more 'n begun to be licked,

But I du think, ez Jeff says, the windbag 's gut pricked;

It'll blow for a spell an' keep puffin' an' wheezin',

The tighter our army an' navy keep squeezin',

For they can't help spread-eaglein' long 'z ther''s a mouth

To blow Enfield's Speaker thru lef at the South.

But it 's high time for us to be settin' our faces

Towards reconstructin' the national basis,

With an eye to beginnin' agin on the jolly ticks

We used to chalk up 'hind the back-door o' politics;

An' the fus' thing 's to save wut of Slav'ry ther' 's lef'

Arter this (I mus' call it) imprudence o' Jeff:

For a real good Abuse, with its roots fur an' wide,

Is the kin' o' thing I like to hev on my side;

A Scriptur' name makes it ez sweet ez a

rose,

An' it's tougher the older an' uglier it grows