as thy waters, have coursed down cheeks, cold, perchance forgotten, into thy drifting depths.

"How is it, Ellen, one comes so to love one's native land, the green hills and running streams ; the clanging birds and fair wild flowersmemories that will not be rooted out? The wondrous second universe that leaps in at the eye, and takes possession of the senses, does it abide in our consciousness for ever? Shall the grass grow green, Ellen, the birds sweetly sing, the blossoms open freshly, in eternity? Ere ever odours assailed the nostril, or jewels flashed on human vision, were they born of the conceptions of God! Thou swiftly-coming eternity, ere we plunge into thy measureless recesses, it is sublime to think we do not go alone; that the past shall be with us, and that in highest empyreum we shall be lulled by harmonies, all akin to those that have soothed us here.

"But inscrutable are these mysteries-long

must be the line that would sound infinity, daring the intellect that would pierce the shrouded grave. We advance a little, but adamantine walls, before which the surge of thought chafes vainly, bar farther access."

IV.

"Sweetest, best, how cheap dear life, were one unfettered! Our wants indeed are few, but to imaginary requirements there is no end. Why must one wear clothes of such hue; eat such food; live in such apartments, and no other? Nature and her great realities are

swallowed up in convention.

"At times, I fancy myself in stream-skirted isle or wooded upland of distant Canada or far Australia. I see a hut raised by willing hands : already a garden blooms in the wilderness, and the forest gives way to waving corn. It is

sunset; ruddy beams shoot athwart the tepid air; a soft voice calls; little ones look for me!

"Alas, it is but a dream; would it were the dawning of a better day! And yet, why not? Oceans insuperable do not roll between us and lands of promise. Where the wayfarer has gone, there also may we go. I ask but room to plant my foot, no one to turn it away, where I may labour, and fruits responsive cheer the glorious toil. Heavens, to sleep, to wake on soil I might call my own, where rolling grass and ripening grain owned no other master! For this, indeed, could I strive; for this, O Ellen, could I work and pray."

V.

"Babylon, ho! Here lie we, amid countless

masts, in a turbid yet noble stream. It is night,

but the vast city is not yet hushed: voluminous sounds reach the ear from afar. Dark clouds cover the seat of future enterprise; what eye shall pierce them? Shall I live and prosper, or, like myriads, sink to rise no more ? Come what may, let there be no faltering hand, no flagging purpose: by the eternal heavens, I shall do or die! Would it were morning, that I might begin; but whither shall I go, to whom shall I apply? There must be noble souls in this wilderness of humanity, this collection of infinite littlenesses. How is it that cities should be so great, and men so small? Does pressure dwarf their dimensions as with the contiguous forest which the snorting gale lays prostrate ?

"Here be your merchant princes, ledger lords. Here, swarming parasites, battening dependants, producing nothing, but living on the heart's blood of those who do. Fiery passion, coercing want, have passed with slimy trail across many

a soul; while some, erst stainless, earn precarious sustenance by corruption's veriest hire. Society, that should foster, gripes them with iron hand, hot, consuming, merciless. Woe, then, for the poor, the miserable; but triple woe and mightiest sympathy for the wicked, the sinful, yet once, yes once, all so innocent and pure.

"Come it will, for it is written in time, when the many must be cared for, as are now the few. I shall not see it, nor thou, dearest, but those who live after us. We shall look on it from a brighter scene, the wanderer's perfect home, where bodily wants and bodily cares shall trouble us no more."

VI.

"Here I am in humble apartments. Screaming itinerants and rumbling vehicles keep up incessant din. My hostess and her children, poor,