to the success of such a work. The noble Piso will excuse me; we are but dealing with abstractions. Oppress those who are in error only to a certain degree, not extreme, and it is most true they cling the closer to their error. We see this in the punishment of children. Their obstinacy and pride are increased by a suffering which is slight, and which seems to say, 'I am too timid, weak, or loving, to inflict more.' So too with our slaves. Whose slaves ever rose a second time against the master's authority, whose first offence, however slight, was met, not by words or lashes, but by racks and the cross?'

'Nay, good Fronto, hold; your zeal for the gods bears you away beyond the bounds of courtesy.'

Forgive me then, great sovereign, and you who are here — if you may; but neither time nor place shall deter me, a minister of the great god of light, from asserting the principles upon which his worship rests, and, as I deem, the empire itself. Under Decius, had true Romans sat on the tribunals, had no hearts too soft for such offices turned traitors to the head, had no accursed epirit of avarice received the bribes which procured security to individuals, families, and communities; had there been no commutations of punishment, then

Peace, I say, Fronto; thou marrest the spirit of the hour. How came we thus again to this point? Such questions are for the council-room or the senate. Yet, truth to say, so stirred seems the mind of this whole people in the matter, that in battle one may as well escape from the din of clashing arms or the groans of the dying, as in Rome avoid this argument. Nay, by my sword! not a voice can I hear, either applauding, disputing, or condemning, since I have set on foot this new war in the east. Once, the city would have rung with acclamations that an army was gathering for such an enterprise. Now, it seems quite forgotten that Valerian once fell, or that, late though it be, he ought to be revenged. This Jewish and Christian argument fills all heads, and clamors on every tongue. Come, let us shake off this dæmon in a new cup, and drink deep to the revenge of Valerian.'

'And of the gods,' ejaculated Fronto, as he lifted the goblet to his lips.'

'There again?' quickly and sharply demanded Aurelian, bending his dark brows upon the offender.

'Doubtless,' said Portia, 'he means well, though over zealous and rash in speech. His heart I am sure seconds not the cruel language of his tongue. So at least I will believe; and in the mean time hope that the zeal he has displayed for the ancient religion of our country may not be without its use upon some present' - glancing her eye toward me and Julia - 'who, with what I trust will prove a brief truancy, have wandered from their household gods and the temples of their fathers.'

May the gods grant it!' added Livia, ' and restore the harmony which should reign in our families and in the capital. Life is over brief to be passed in quarrel. Now let us abandon our cups. Sir Christian Piso! lead me to the gardens, and let the others follow as they may our good example.'

The gardens we found, as we passed from the palace, to be most brilliantly illuminated with lamps of every form and hue. We seemed suddenly to have passed to another world, so dream-like was the effect of the multitudinous lights, as they fell with white, red, lurid, or golden glare upon bush or tree, grotto, statue, or marble fountain.

Forget here, Lucius Piso,' said the kind-hearted Livia, what you have just heard from the lips of that harsh bigot, the savage Fronto. Who could have looked for such madness! Not again, if I possess the power men say I do, shall he sit at the table of Aurelian. Poor Julia too! But see! she walks with Tacitus. Wisdom and mercy are married in him, and both will shed comfort on her.'

'I cannot but lament,' I replied, 'that a creature like Fronto should have won his way so far into the confidence of Aurelian. But I fear him not, and do not believe that he will have power to urge the emperor to the adoption of measures, to which his own wisdom and native feelings must stand opposed. The rage of such men as Fronto, and the silent pity and scorn of men immeasurably his superiors, we have both now learned to bear without complaint, though not without some inward suffering. To be shut out from the hearts of so many who once ran to meet us on our approach, nor only that, but to be held by them as impious and atheistical, monsters whom the earth is sick of, and whom the gods are besought to destroy this is a part of our burden which we feel to be heaviest. Heaven preserve to us the smiles and the love of Livia!' 'Doubt not that they will ever be yours. But I trust that sentiments like those of Tacitus will bear sway in the councils of Aurelian, and that the present calm will not be disturbed.'

Thus conversing we wandered on, beguiled by such talk and the attractive splendors of the garden, till we found ourselves separated, apparently by some distance, from our other friends; none passed us and none met us. We had reached a remote and solitary spot, where fewer lamps had been hung, and the light was faint and unequal. Not sorry to be thus alone, we seated ourselves on the low pedestal of a group of statuary once the favorite resort of the fair and false Terentia - whose forms could scarcely be defined, and which was enveloped at a few paces distant with shrubs and flowers, forming a thin wall of partition between us and another walk, corresponding to the one we were in, but winding away in different direction. We had sat not long, either silent or conversing, ere our attention was caught by the sound of approaching voices apparently in earnest discourse. A moment and we knew them to be those of Fronto and Aurelian.

'By the gods his life shall answer it!' said Aurelian with vehemence, but with suppressed tones; who but he was to observe the omens ? Was I to know that to-day is the Ides, and to-morrow the day after? The rites must be postponed.'

It were better not, in my judgment,' said Fronto; all the other signs are favorable. Never, Papirius assured me, did the sacred chickens seize so eagerly the crumbs. Many times, as he closely watched, did he observe them which is rare drop them from

their mouths overfilled. The times he has exactly recorded. A rite like this put off, when all Rome is in expectation, would, in the opinion of all the world, be of a more unfavorable interpretation, than if more than the day were against us.'

'You counsel well. Let it go on.'

'But to insure a fortunate event, and propitiate the gods, I would early, and before the august ceremonies, offer the most costly and acceptable sacrifice.'

That were well also. In the prisons there are captives of Germany, of Gaul, of Egypt, and Palmyra. Take what and as many as you will. If we ever make sure of the favor of the gods, it is when we offer freely that which we hold at the highest price.'

'I would rather they were Christians,' urged Fronto.

That cannot be,' said Aurelian. I question if there be a Christian within the prison walls; and, were there hundreds, it is not a criminal I would bring to the altar. I would as soon offer a diseased or ill-shaped bull.'

But it were an easy matter to seize such as we might want. Not, O Aurelian, till this accursed race is exterminated, will the heavens smile as formerly upon our country. Why are the altars thus forsaken? Why are the temples no longer thronged as once? Why do the great, and the rich, and the learned, silently withhold their aid, or openly scoff and jeer? Why are our sanctuaries crowded only by the scum and refuse of the city?'

'I know not. Question me not thus.'

'Is not the reason palpable and gross to the dullest mind? Is it not because of the daily growth of this blaspheming and atheistical crew, who, by horrid arts, seduce the young, the timid, and, above all, the women, who ever draw the world with them, to join them in their unhallowed orgies, thus stripping the temples of their worshippers, and dragging the gods themselves from their seats? Think you the gods look on with pleasure, while their altars and temples are profaned or abandoned, and a religion that denies them rears itself upon their ruins ?"

'I know not. Say no more.'

Is it possible religion or the state should prosper, while he who is not only Vicegerent of the gods, Universal Monarch, but what is more, their sworn Pontifex Maximus, connives at their existence and dissemination

'Thou liest!'

'Harboring, even beneath the imperial roof, and feasting at the imperial table, the very heads and chief ministers of this black mischief

'Hold! I say. I swear, by all the gods known and unknown, that another word, and thy head shall answer it! Is my soul that of a lamb, that I need this stirring up to deeds of blood? Am I so lame and backward, when the gods are to be defended, that I am to be thus charged? Let the lion sleep when he will; chafed too much, and he may spring and slay at random. I love not the Christians, nor any who flout the gods and their worship that thou knowest well. But I love Piso, Aurelia, and the divine Julia — that thou knowest as well. Now no more.'

'For my life,' said Fronto, I hold it cheap, if I may but be faithful to my office and the gods.'

'I believe it, Fronto. The gods will reward thee. Let us on.' In the earnestness of their talk, they had paused and stood just before us, being separated but by a thin screen of shrubs. We continued rooted to our seats while this conversation went on, held there both by the impossibility of withdrawing without observation, and by a desire to hear I confess it what was thus in a manner forced upon me, and concerned so nearly, not only myself, but thousands of my fellow Christians.

When they were hidden from us by the winding of the path, we rose and turned toward the palace.

That savage!' said Livia. How strange that Aurelian, who knows so well how to subdue the world, should have so little power to shake off this reptile.'

There is power enough,' I replied; but alas! I fear the will is wanting. Superstition is as deep a principle in the breast of Aurelian as ambition, and of that Fronto is the most fitting high-priest. Aurelian places him at the head of religion in the state for those very qualities, whose fierce expression has now made us tremble. Let us hope that the emperor will remain where he now is, in a position from which it seems Fronto is unable to dislodge him, and all will go well.'

We soon reached the palace, where, joining Julia and Portia, our chariot soon bore us to the Coelian Hill. Farewell.

STANZAS.

'Talk not to us of the days of chivalry!'

TALK not to us of the old castles gray,
Or of the gallant knights and ladies gay,
That dazzled their courts in days gone by,
Or of bannered towers that kissed the sky,
Or of bastions, walls, and turrets proud,
Where the war-notes rang from clarion loud!

Talk not to us of the fierce battle-shout
Of the olden time, when the prince led out
His vasal knights, with their villeins born,
In bondage held, and to fealty sworn,
Where the soul was fired, and swords were red
With the curdling blood of the gallant dead!

Talk not to us of the banquet hall,
Where revelled the proud, and knelt the thrall,
Where the Trouvére's lay and Troubadour's song
Softened the hearts of the brave and the strong,
And the richest wines from the sparkling bowl
Quickened the pulse of the sluggish soul!

We heed not the tales of that olden time;
Too oft do they tell us of deeds of crime:

We dwell in a new and a distant land,

Where the wind blows free from the ocean-strand,

Nor bears on its wings to the boundless west,
The burning curse of a people oppressed!

New-York, May, 1838.

J. K. E.

LITERARY NOTICES.

JOURNAL OF AN EXPLORING TOUR BEYOND THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS, under the Direction of the American Board of Foreign Missions. Performed in the years 1835, '36, and '37; with a Map of the Oregon Territory. By Rev. SAMUEL PARKER, A. M. In one volume. pp. 317. Ithaca, (N. Y.) Published for the Author. NewYork: A. K. BERTRON, 451 Broadway.

SPREAD before you, reader, a map of that portion of this continent which stretches westward from a line with the Council Bluffs, on the Missouri River, and with the above-named work in your hand, follow its author in all his journeyings, until you reach with him that iron-bound coast, where mountain barriers repel the dark rolling waves of the Pacific, which stretches, without an intervening island, for five thousand miles, to the coast of Japan. What a vast extent of country you have traversed; how sublime the works of the CREATOR, through which you have taken your way! We lack space to follow our author in the detail of his far wanderings, and shall not therefore attempt a notice at large of the volume under consideration, but shall endeavor to present, in a general view, some of its more prominent features. Mr. PARKER was sent out by the American Board of Foreign Missions; and he appears to have been eminently faithful to his trust, amidst numerous perils and privations, which are recorded, not with vain boasting and exaggeration, but with becoming modesty and brevity. His descriptions, indeed, are all of them graphic, without being minute or tedious. Before reaching the Black Hills, he places before us the prairies, rolling in immense seas of verdure, on which millions of tons of grass grow up but to rot on the ground, or feed whole leagues of flame; over which sweep the cool breezes, like the trade-winds of the ocean, and into whose green recesses bright-eyed antelopes bound away, with half-whistling snuff, leaving the fleetest hound hopelessly in the rear. There herd the buffaloes, by thousands together, dotting the landscape, seeming scarce so large as rabbits, when surveyed at a distance from some verdant bluff, swelling up in the emerald waste. Sublimer far, and upon a more magnificent scale, are the scenes among the Rocky Mountains. Here are the visible footsteps of GOD! Yonder, mountain above mountain, peak above peak, ten thousand feet heavenward, to regions of perpetual snow, rise the guardian Titans of that mighty region. Here the traveller thrids his winding way through passages so narrow, that the towering perpendicular cliffs throw a dim twilight gloom upon his path, even at mid-day. Anon he emerges, and lo! a cataract descends a distant mountain, like a belt of snowy foam, girding its giant sides. On one hand, mountains spread out into horizontal plains, some rounded like domes, and others terminating in sharp cones, and abrupt eminences, taking the forms of pillars, pyramids, and castles; on the other, vast circular embankments, thrown up by volcanic fires, mark out the site of a yawning crater; while far below, perchance, a river dashes its way through a narrow, rocky passage, with a deep-toned roar, in winding mazes, in mist and darkness. Follow the voyager, as he descends the Columbia, subject to winds, rapids, and falls, two hundred miles from any whites, and amid tribes of