The first emotions which touched my breast were those of mingled pity and veneration. But how soon were all my feelings changed! The lips of Plato were never more worthy of a prognostic swarm of bees than were the lips of this holy man! It was a day of the administration of the sacrament; and his subject, of course, was the passion of our Saviour. I had heard the subject handled a thousand times: I had thought it exhausted long ago. Little did I suppose that, in the wild woods of America, I was to meet with a man whose eloquence would give to this topic a new and more sublime pathos than I had ever before witnessed.

As he descended from the pulpit, to distribute the mystic symbols, there was a peculiar, a more than human, solemnity in his air and manner, which made my blood run cold, and my whole frame shiver. He then drew a picture of the sufferings of our Saviour; his trial before Pilate; his ascent up Calvary; his crucifixion; and his death. I knew the whole history; but never, until then, had I heard the circumstances so selected, so arranged, so colored! It was all new; and I seemed to have heard it for the first time in my life. His enunciation was so deliberate, that his voice trembled on every syllable; and every heart in the assembly trembled in unison. His peculiar phrases had such force of description, that the original scene appeared to be at that moment acting before our eyes. We saw the very faces of the Jews; the staring, frightful distortions of malice and rage. We saw the buffet: my soul kindled with a flame of indignation; and my hands were involuntarily and convulsively clinched.

But when he came to touch on the patience, the forgiving meekness, of our Saviour; when he drew, to the life, his blessed eyes streaming in tears to heaven; his voice breathing to God a soft and gentle prayer of pardon for his enemies, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do!"-the voice of the preacher, which all along faltered, grew fainter and fainter, until, his utterance being entirely obstructed by the force of his feelings, he raised his handkerchief to his eyes, and burst into a loud and irrepressible flow of grief. The effect was inconceivable. The whole

house resounded with the mingled groans and sobs and shrieks of the congregation.

It was some time before the tumult had subsided so far as to permit him to proceed. Indeed, judging by the usual but fallacious standard of my own weakness, I began to be very uneasy for the situation of the preacher. For I could not conceive how he would be able to let his audience down from the height to which he had wound them, without impairing the solemnity and dignity of his subject, or perhaps shocking them by the abruptness of the fall. But-no: the descent was as beautiful and sublime, as the elevation had been rapid and enthusiastic. The first sentence with which he broke the awful silence was a quotation from Rousseau: "Socrates died like a philosopher; but Jesus Christ, like a God!"

I despair of giving you any idea of the effect produced by this short sentence, unless you could perfectly conceive the whole manner of the man, as well as the peculiar crisis in the discourse. Never before did I completely understand what Demosthenes meant by laying such stress on delivery. You are to bring before you the venerable figure of the preacher, his blindness constantly recalling to your recollection old Homer, Ossian, and Milton, and associating with his performance the melancholy grandeur of their genius: you are to imagine that you hear his slow, solemn, well-accented enunciation, and his voice of affecting, trembling melody: you are to remember the pitch of passion and enthusiasm to which the congregation were raised; and then the few moments of portentous, death-like silence which reigned throughout the house: the preacher, removing his white handkerchief from his aged face (even yet wet from the recent torrent of his tears), and slowly stretching forth the palsied hand which holds it, begins the sentence: “Socrates died like a philosopher"-then pausing, raised his other hand, pressing them both, clasped together, with warmth and energy to his breast, lifting his "sightless balls" to heaven, and pouring his whole soul into his tremulous voice -"but Jesus Christ-like a God!" If he had been in truth an angel of light, the effect could scarcely have been more divine.

THE BROKEN PITCHER.

As beautiful Kitty one morning was tripping,

With a pitcher of milk, from the Fair of Coleraine, When she saw me she stumbled, the pitcher it tumbled, And all the sweet buttermilk watered the plain. “Oh, what shall I do now?-'twas looking at you nov Sure, sure, such a pitcher I'll ne'er meet again! 'Twas the pride of my dairy: O Barney M'Cleary! You're sent as a plague to the girls of Coleraine.”

I sat down beside her, and gently did chide her,
That such a misfortune should give her such pain.
A kiss then I gave her; and, ere I did leave her,

She vowed for such pleasure she'd break it again.
'Twas hay-making season,-I can't tell the reason,—
Misfortunes will never come single, 'tis plain;
For very soon after poor Kitty's disaster-
Sure, never a pitcher was whole in Coleraine,

THE LOST STEAMSHIP.-FITZ-JAMES O'BRIEN.

"Ho, there! Fisherman, hold your hand! Tell me what is that far away

There, where over the Isle of Sand

Hangs the mist-cloud sullen and gray?

See! it rocks with a ghastly life,

Rising and rolling through clouds of spray, Right in the midst of the breakers' strifeTell me, what is it, Fisherman, pray?"

"That, good sir, was a steamer stout

As ever paddled around Cape Race;

And many's the wild and stormy bout

She had with the winds in that self-same place;

But her time was come; and at ten o'clock

Last night she struck on that lonesome shore;
And her sides were gnawed by the hidden rock,
And at dawn this morning she was no more."

66 Come, as you seem to know, good man,
The terrible fate of this gallant ship,
Tell me about her all that you can;
And here's my flask to moisten your lip.

Tell me how many she had aboard

Wives, and husbands, and lovers true

How did it fare with her human hoard;
Lost she many or lost she few?"
"Master, I may not drink of your flask,
Already too moist I feel my lip;
But I'm ready to do what else you ask,
And spin you my yarn about the ship:
"Twas ten o'clock, as I said, last night,

When she struck the breakers and went ashore:

And scarce had broken the morning's light

Than she sunk in twelve feet of water, or more.

"But long ere this they knew her doom,

And the Captain called all hands to prayer; And solemnly over the ocean's boom

The orisons rose on the troublous air.
And round about the vessel there rose
Tall plumes of spray as white as snow,
Like angels in their ascension clothes,
Waiting for those who prayed below.
"So these three hundred people clung

As well as they could to spar and rope;
With a word of prayer on every tongue,
Nor on any face a glimmer of hope.
But there was no blubbering weak and wild—
Of tearful faces I saw but one,

A rough old salt, who cried like a child,

And not for himself, but the Captain's son.

"The Captain stood on the quarter-deck,
Firm, but pale, with trumpet in hand;
Sometimes he looked at the breaking wreck,
Sometimes he sadly looked to land.
And often he smiled to cheer the crew-
But, oh! the smile was terrible grim-
"Till over the quarter a huge sea flew;
And that was the last they saw of him.

"I saw one young fellow, with his bride,
Standing a-midships upon the wreck;
His face was white as the boiling tide,
And she was clinging about his neck.
And I saw them try to say good-by,

But neither could hear the other speak;
So they floated away through the sea to die-
Shoulder to shoulder, and cheek to cheek.
"And there was a child, but eight at best,
Who went his way in a sea she shipped;
All the while holding upon his breast

A little pet parrot, whose wings were clipped

And as the boy and the bird went by,
Swinging away on a tall wave's crest,

They were gripped by a man, with a drowning cry
And together the three went down to rest.

"And so the crew went one by one,

Some with gladness, and few with fear; Cold and hardship such work had done

That few seemed frightened when death was near.
Thus every soul on board went down--
Sailor and passenger, little and great;
The last that sank was a man of my town,
A capital swimmer-the second mate."
"Now, lonely Fisherman, who are you,
That say you saw this terrible wreck?
How do I know what you say is true,

When every mortal was swept from the deck?
Where were you in that hour of death?
How did you learn what you relate?"

His answer came in an under-breath

FISHERMAN'S HUT, CHESAPEAKE BAY, 1876.

When you was here some sixteen year
Or so, aback, you says

A darkey named Kyarlina Jim,
He fished f'om dis yer place?

Dat yonder's him, Kyarlina Jim,
On de bench dar by de do';-
He have been po' an' weak an' bline
Sence dat long time ago.

Yes-dat 's de way he spen's each day
O' de blessed year, 'dout fail,
Wid face turned out'ard to's de bay,
Like watchin' fur a sail.

Eben when clouds 'ull come in crowds,

An' de beatin' win's 'ull blow,

He still keeps settin', pashunt, dar
In his old place by de do'.

An' de sweet sunlight, 'tis jes like night,
Ter po' Kyarlina Jim—

He's weak an' bline; so rain an' shine
Is all de same ter him.