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shady groves, and the whispering voices of cool

waters.

The ephemeral insects, too, enjoy their transitory existence, and weave airy dances through slant sunbeams, mirthfully, as if no frost would herald night, and send them to their tiny graves; and for whom the merry elves might mourn, were the elves here; but alas! we may fancy them flown from the biting tempests—

"Where do the fairies hide their heads
In Winter's storms and rain?
They cannot sip the dew that falls

Till the green leaves come again."

Most charming creatures of the poet's imagination! None but a thoroughly prosaic utilitarian would seek to banish you from our dales. Still hover, then, over your favourite fountains, and describe mystic measures on the chosen hillside, as in the days that are bygones.

Now, occasionally, gay butterflies burst from their self-wrought cells, and flit amongst the blossoms that hardily defy every north wind; for even in February both fields and gardens present a variety of coloured blooms in sheltered spots. They are pale indeed; a sickly shadow hangs upon them: Winter, with unkind hand, has rudely touched their petals, and, like their delicate aerial visitants, in the eye of fancy they may be likened to etherial spirits looking on the abodes of grief-working crime, and weeping in their spotless purity to behold the foulness of the impure.

Linger not now in the garden bowers-pause not beside the ice-locked fountain; but let us hasten to scenes where Nature reigns unfettered, and improvement or mischief rarely comes. Oh, it is glorious to tread along mountain tops, with heather and bracken crisp beneath our feet, after the keen frost of the previous night; whilst every little pool and runnel resembles a frozen lake or arrested river, bearing whole forests of miniature ice-decorated trees on its margin-tall rushes, sedge-leaves, and marsh grasses, all magnified by the beautiful covering Winter's curious workmanship has thrown over them.

Delightful is it to breast the cold breeze that brings tears into our eyes, and dyes our cheeks with a deeper crimson, all the while imparting health and vigour as it sweeps onwards, viewless, but not unheard. How it soughs among the heath afar off, and now moans amid the dark, stiff, ghost-like fir branches, like a wailing spirit of the pathless wild, perpetually wandering, ever seeking, but never finding, rest! Shortly it dies away in dim distance, with a shrill, but low whistle, till we pause, and half persuade ourselves that that creature of the elements is in verity a spiritual thing. Anon, there mingles with its voice, rising amid the still, clear blue atmosphere, from valleys far below, the sound of village time-bells, counting the rapid lapse of a short winter's day. Distinctly, as if we stood beside the belfry in the old church-yard, that chime falls upon our ears, and our thoughts perhaps involuntarily wander from the magnificent desert we are pacing, to the

secluded little spot where sleep our rural dead. Many a time and oft those rustic fathers, in hearty youth or green old age, trod the path we tread upon the mountain. Of a certainty we must one day, like them, essay a darker road, and sleep beneath the turf of the valley! So, linking these things together, we hold, as it were, a mental communion with the departed.

Away! away! Our time is more than halfspent: we will again to the vale. Let us for awhile wander through its leafless woods, gaze on its crystal rivulets, now gushing noiselessly beneath their superincumbent glassy crust, and search its wide snow-sprinkled meadows, satisfied that in every spot where chance or fancy may lead our devious steps, we shall discover abundance of objects to interest the philosopher, to charm the poet, and to afford a never-failing source of humility and gratitude to the Christian. Soon, very soon, the sinking sun will drop in rosy splendour behind yonder already empurpled hill, to close in glory, as he began in brightness, the fast-waning day of FEBRUARY.

STANZAS.

BY MRS. F. B. SCOTT.

Why did Fate, malignant, sever
Hearts that would be faithful ever,

Held in sweetest union ?
Why, when summer skies looked brightest,
And those bounding hearts beat lightest,

Strike in death their high communion ?

Then the sunlight on the river,
Snowy arrows from Hope's quiver,

Birds upon the wing,

In the glorious noonlight glancing,
Imaged out the wild entrancing

Of those sweet souls slumbering.

Slumbering-for Passion's power
Coiled lay within the flower,

Peace-destroying bee:

When from that retreat he started,
Hope and Joy with him departed,
Darkening a soul so free.

Now a wanderer lone and weary,
In the midnight dark and dreary,
Near the river's flow-
By her guardian sprite forsaken,
Mem'ry's spell can only waken

From her wild heart tones of woe.

They were streams in silence blending,
Till the rugged rock descending

Turn'd their course apart→→
They were flowers, whose foliage twining,
Bloomed whilst summer suns were shining,
Till a snow-storm struck the heart.

But Time's iron wheel revolving,
Every problem shall be solving;

Rose-leaves, sere and blighted,
Through long years retain their essence;
And the stream's refulgent presence
Angel-eyes shall see united!

THE DAWN OF LOVE.

"Oh! you, that have the charge of Love,
Keep him in rosy bondage bound,
As in the fields of bliss above

He sits with flow'rets fettered round;
Loose not a tie that round him clings,
Nor ever let him use his wings;
For e'en an hour, a minute's flight,
Will rob the plumes of half their light.
Like that celestial bird, whose crest
Is found beneath far eastern skies-
Whose wings though radiant when at rest,
Lose all their glory when he flies!"

Moore.

he

anxiously-not impatient to hear his answer;
has learned it already from her speaking face.
Still the maiden leans against the rock, a thou-
sand joyful emotions-

"Hopes, and fears that nourish hope,
An undistinguishable throng;
And gentle wishes long subdued,
Subdued and cherished long".

but in this they are of peculiar effect. The extreme lowliness and even poverty of her appearance, and the exquisite emotions painted in her face, declare, more powerfully than any words, how little happiness depends on worldly splendours or artificial pleasures, and how the purest and holiest and most beautiful sentiments are common to all hearts, irrespective of rank and station. Viewed in this light, the maiden seems, as it were, an embodiment of the poetry of Nature.

"The Dawn of Love!"-Such is the very attractive title of a very attractive picture now hanging in the print-shops. Few persons pass it without a casual glance; and very few are content with only a casual glance-it well repays close scrutiny. The subject is undoubtedly one of universal interest, and the artist has treated it in the most effective, because in the most natural manner possible: he has judiciously dispensed with all artificial embellishments. agitating her heart, and adding new beauties to Admirable as his painting may be as a work of her changing countenance. Her whole appearart, its greatest charm consists in its exceeding ance is most attractive: her personal charms, simplicity of design, which is peculiarly appro- the modest dignity of her bearing, and her humpriate to the subject which it illustrates. The ble attire-the rustic plaid and the bare arms and scene is a rural glen, by the borders of a water-feet-would excite attention in any situation, fall; and the hero and heroine are a Highland lad and lassie. The time is happily chosen. The maiden has apparently come to fetch water from the brook; where, either by accident or appointment, she has met her lover. Having placed her pitcher under the waterfall, she is leaning back against a broken rock, waiting patiently for it to fill. Meanwhile, the youth has spoken; what he has said we may perhaps surmise, and he is waiting for a reply. Seated on a lowly fragment of rock at a little distance, he looks up at her tenderly and inquiringly. She, however, is in no haste to speak-indeed she hardly seems to think an answer required; she remains with her hands clasped, and her looks downcast, apparently absorbed in conscious delight. It is thus the artist has portrayed them. The eloquent silence of that momentous moment appeals to us irresistibly, conveying an impression of exquisite happiness and perfect peace. As we contemplate the scene, we are fain to believe it a reality, and we participate in the feelings of the lovers, who seem to fear either by word or look to interrupt such complete felicity. The moments pass: still they retain their position: still the youth waits on his lowly seat, his head resting on his hand, looking up inquiringly-inquiringly, but not

The moments pass, still she speaks not: her soul is wrapt in Elysium, she has no words for earth. Love, modesty, and joy, are glowing in her face; it is difficult to say which predominates; but we are wrong in attempting to distinguish such emotions, for they are inseparable. Still the maiden leans against the rock, still her lover looks up at her askingly. The pitcher is long since filled, the sparkling water streams from it in all directions; and the shepherd's dog, weary of waiting, sleeps soundly at his master's feet. Nothing disturbs the silence, nothing mars the harmony of the hour.

Apart from the individual attractions of the group, there is something most pleasing and suggestive in this rural scene-beautiful as a glimpse of sunshine, and refreshing as the breath

and verdant as the floral bowers of Eden. The murmur of the falling water makes as sweet a music in their ears as the harmonious warblings of the celestial groves-and so we would have it with them. So we rejoice it is; and while we gaze upon them, (so fully are we persuaded of their reality), we almost breathe a prayer that so it may continue; that however rugged may be their future way, or however desolate the land through which it leads, an atmosphere of love continually surrounding them may render their path blooming and verdant-a vestige of Paradise ever in the vale of tears; for so Love can make it.

of morning, well is it called the Dawn. It brings vividly before the mind of the beholder the happiest epoch in one of the happiest of emotions-the Dawn of Love; a season singularly analogous to the hour of sunrise, when the distant horizon appears radiant with glory, and every surrounding object seems couleur de rose; a season-aptly symbolised by the maiden's pitcher at the brook-when the heart, filled with joy from an eternal well-spring, out of the abundance of its treasure diffuses happiness all around; a season when all that is elevated and holy has most effect upon the imagination, and most influence on the heart. The furnace of affliction may effectually purify the dross of hu- Such romantic fancies occupy our thoughts man nature; but happiness has a quicker fire, as we stand by the windows of the print-shop, and while it lasts performs the process as contemplating this beautiful engraving. At completely. When Love exists in all its purity length, filled with earnest aspirations for the and spirituality, it nourishes the soul in good-future happiness of the lovers, we reluctantly ness; for it contains in itself the elements of the turn away, bestowing on them a last lingering three great virtues which should regulate our look. sentiments towards ourselves, our fellow-men, and our Maker-humility, charity, and devotion. Who is more humble than he who truly loves? The same feeling which invests the beloved with every possible perfection, strips the lover of every self-imagined virtue, and overpowers him with the conviction of his unworthiness. At the very time when he would fain regard himself most favourably, his eyes are opened, and he recognises his insignificance. Humility is ever the inseparable companion of Love. Again, what heart so overflows with Charity-which is universal Love-as that in which a strong affection for another has destroyed all selfishness and egotism, and given an irresistible impulse to all gentle and kindly emotions? This Love

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"The heart that in love will the most adore,

Has another and higher it loves the more." He who has tasted all the sweetest and purest joys of earthly love, can more especially appreciate the exceeding excellence of a love more sweet, more pure, more joyful, than any that earth or things earthly can occasion. The same feeling which makes the world, for the time being, a paradise, enables us the more accurately to value, and the more eagerly to desire, the enduring happiness of heaven. Hence, as we have said, this passion gives a peculiar stimulus to the three mainsprings of virtue.

It was in Paradise that Love first " dawned;" and ever since, every succeeding "Dawn" has conjured up a resemblance of the celestial region. Contemplating the lovers by the waterfall, we feel it is so with them. To them the rugged landscape and barren rocks are blooming

With difficulty we draw our eyes from the sweet countenance of the loving maiden, and they fall upon a portrait of the unhappy Duchess of Praslin! Startled by a sight so inaccordant with our thoughts, we hurriedly look in another direction, and encounter the rubicond visage of Mrs. Caudle! A casual chance might have thus assembled such incongruous pictures; but what a moral lesson does not the chance combination teach! what a gloomy train of thought does it not suggest!

Turning from the print-shop, we pursue our way; but it is not so easy to turn from the reflections they inspired. Our fond illusions are suddenly dispelled, our hopeful imaginings have received a cruel check. Recalling the scene by the waterfall, we ask ourselves again and again, if by any marvellous metamorphosis those lovers could be converted into actors in an appalling tragedy, or even disputants in a contentious quarrel. Think again of the sweet timidity of the maiden's face-think again of the earnest tenderness of her lover's regard. No, impossible! Violent passion or petty discord can never destroy their peace, or dim the lustre of their love. Impossible! Yet admitting thisadmitting that our favourite scene could never be followed by a catastrophe similar to either of those suggested-must we not also admit that they most probably had been preceded by interviews somewhat resembling this? The features of Mrs. Caudle were once eloquent with tenderness, her eyes downcast in modest happiness, her voice hardly audible in excess of timid emotion. And look at her portrait now!

Or, if we think of that appalling sight, when the wife lay murdered by her husband's hand, is not its horror, if possible, augmented when we suppose it the sequel to some such scene as that by the Waterfall? Think of that white hand, rigid in death, still grasping the hair torn from the head of the once beloved; and think of the time when those same small fingers have tenderly pushed back the locks from his brow! We will not linger on this horrible theme, although a lesson might be learned from it. We

set it aside entirely. Mrs. Caudle will serve our purpose as well, or perhaps even more effectually.

Recognising as all must recognise - the great truthfulness of her portraiture, and well aware that there exist very many who bear Mrs. Caudle a strong family likeness, we are tempted to ask if Love must have a Decline as well as a Dawn. Must a passion, whose "rising" is so beautiful, set in clouds and darkness, and leave only the gloom of night? Is a feeling so unearthly not then immortal? Has the "Plant of Paradise" only "survived the fall" to exhibit its beauty before it wither? To such inquiries we would fain utter a strenuous negative. We must still believe with the poet, that Love "Is indestructible,

Its holy flame for ever burneth;

A something light as air-a look,
A word unkind or wrongly taken,
Ah! Love, that tempests never shook,

A breath, a touch like this hath shaken.
And ruder words will soon rush in
To spread the breach that words begin;
And eyes forget the gentle ray
They wore in courtship's smiling day;
And voices lose the tone that shed
A tenderness round all they said;
Till fast declining, one by one,
The sweetnesses of love are gone;
And hearts, so lately mingled, seem
Like broken clouds-or like the stream,
That smiling left the mountain's brow

As though its waters ne'er could sever,
Yet, ere it reach the plain below,

Breaks into floods that part for ever."

Is not the picture too correct? If we look From heaven it came, to heaven returneth." around us a little, we shall find only too many illustrations of its truth-we shall find only Yet, believing this, while we reflect (not on ter- too many instances of an apparent decline of rible and happily rare catastrophes, but) on the love. In some cases domestic happiness is teachings of daily experience, gleaned from the marred by a perpetual though hardly perceptible angry tones, harsh words, and sullen looks of variance, like the uneasy motion of a boat when those who once were lovers, we come to the con- the rowers do not strike simultaneously: in clusion that if Love itself be immortal, its out- others by sudden but transient outbreaks, reward demonstrations are of sadly too transient sembling the occasional jarring in a piece of a character. By outward demonstrations, be it music when one note is out of tune; in others observed, we do not refer to sentimental phrases again there is a constant " bickering and deand tender epithets, which, so far from denoting bate;" yet perhaps in all these cases, notwithaffection, too often only signify its absence. What standing external appearances, true affection we lament is the terrible contrast so often ex-exists; which, however, only renders the dishibited by the devotion and self-forgetfulness of putants more unhappy; forlovers, and the selfishness and discord which mark their domestic life. And we seek to learn by what marvellous process the devoted, admiring youth, who believes her whom he has chosen the

"Loveliest, virtuousest, discreetest, best" of women, and the timid maiden, whose whole existence seems wrapped up in him she loves, can be converted into an exacting, dissatisfied husband, and a fretful, fault-finding wife. We ask how this change can be effected: the poet has told us. The poet, who has so exquisitely pourtrayed Love in its various phases, has given a marvellously truthful description of its gradual decline and fall. His views upon this subject cannot be too often conned: they should be treasured up by the domestic hearth, and continually muttered as a charm to keep off discord and preserve peace.

At the risk of repeating what is already well known, we must record them here; they so peculiarly and forcibly illustrate our theme-the disunion of lovers, and consequent disappearance of love. "Alas!" exclaims the poet, sharing in

our sentiment

"Alas! how light a cause may move

Dissension between hearts that love!
Hearts that the world in vain has tried,
And sorrow but more closely tied;

That stood the storm when waves were rough,
Yet in a sunny hour fall off,

Like ships that have gone down at sea,
When heaven was all tranquillity!

"To be wrath with one we love

Doth work like madness in the brain."

With another and a very numerous class the reign of Love is shortened, not by internal differences, but by external influences. The husband is engrossed with business; all his time and all his thoughts are devoted to some important, and perhaps necessary, pursuit; and an imperceptible but impassable barrier intervenes between hearts which once were closely and, as it seemed, inseparably united; or perhaps the wife loves pleasure (so called) and the admiration of the world, and innocently enough, as she imagines, gives all her care and attention to procuring amusement for herself and her friends, while the one who once was every one to her, is unthought of, or his admiration not deemed worth the trouble of seeking. Sometimes both husband and wife sympathize in one sentiment-the love of society, and both take pleasure in "living" in the world. For a time such things may afford them a passing gratification, but can we wonder if their domestic happiness be destroyed? To take an example from reality-who that had sympathized with the loves of Harry Coningsby and Edith Millbank, and remembered the scene in the fishing cottage in the days of their "Dawn of Love," but was chilled and disappointed on meeting with a recent picture of their married life?-the husband immersed in politics, and the wife the belle of the gay world! What time for romantic love?" asks

a fiction that is as familiar as a

their historian; "they were never an hour alone!" And yet he adds that they were still tenderly attached to each other. Nevertheless, their domestic happiness was virtually destroyed. Valuable flowers will not bloom without culture; they cannot exist without a kindly climate, and the most valuable, the "Plant of Paradise" ("Domestic Bliss"), will only flourish in the genial atmosphere of home. Yet even by the fireside, as we have seen, its growth is sometimes stunted; even here it is not sufficiently protected; jealousy and discord, and other malignant spirits, strip it of its blossoms; and, deprived of its beauty, the "Plant of Paradise" soon ceases to exist. Both conclusions are most lamentable; but alas! not the less true. Would it were otherwise; for to all who truly appreciate the mystical beauty and excellence of love, angry tones or polite formality, between those who have been lovers, is more repulsive than the harshest discord that ever marred the most celestial melody. While to those who yet are lovers, dissensions among their married friends have somewhat the chilling effect of the skeleton at the Egyptian feasts, saying, "To this thou also must come." In vain the heart, strong in its conscious affection, gives an emphatic denial to the gloomy prophecy; reason and experience are against it, and the most hopeful hesitate, and the timid shudder. Or should a few, confident in themselves, venture to declare that they will form exceptions to the general rule, and realize the poet's Elysium on Earth'

"Where two that are linked in one heavenly tie,

With heart never changing, and brow never cold,
Love on through all ills, and love on till they die!"

assurance, that her affection can never in any wise diminish, and that her continual tenderness will prevent her husband's from declining. Fond delusion! She trusts in the stability of the human heart, than which nothing is more inconstant: she confides in the strength of human nature, than which nothing is more feeble. Happy would it be for her, did one of those friends, now smiling over her youthful ardour, and predicting its brief duration, teach her how to preserve in their present strength and beauty the exquisite emotions of her young heart, and render the Dawn of her love only the precursor of an eternal meridian.

In Paradise, where trees and flowers bloomed spontaneously, without labour or care of man, virtue was natural to the heart, and love flourished in his own atmosphere. But when the flaming sword guarded the celestial region, and fallen man was exiled to an ungenial clime, the earth of herself only brought forth weeds and thistles-flowers and fruits required the toil of man, only in the sweat of his brow could he eat bread. As it was with the external, so it is with the internal world. Vices and errors spring up naturally in our hearts, while all goodness and virtue requires to be planted by the Heavenly Husbandman, and tended with our unceasing care. To this rule even Love is no exception. True it seems, at first especially, to bloom spontaneously, because (to pursue the metaphor) the soil is more peculiarly adapted to this plant than to any other. Hence the care of the labourer is at first chiefly required, not to stimulate its growth, but to prevent its too great luxuriance. He must, by stripping off the superfluous foliage, endeavour to strengthen the stem, so that while it their friends, smiling scornfully or pityingly at" strikes its roots downwards," finding nourishtheir delusion, unanimously assure them It is ment in the richest and choicest particles of the always so !-every one says the same, but every soil (all that is best and sweetest and noblest in one ends by doing the same. You will some day human nature), it may "extend its branches quarrel quite as much as your neighbours, and upwards," bearing fruit abundantly (the fruit think nothing of it!" Well may the young bride of meekness, patience, self-denial, charity, gratitremble when the merry peal announces her mar-tude, and joy). If left to itself, it will bear no riage-day, lest she be about to dispel the beau-fruit, only fragrant blossoms of delicate beauty, tiful halo of happiness shed round her by the dawning of Love-lest a sad reality take the place of her hopeful, delicious dreamings. Well may she deem that, however grievous, separation now were better, infinitely better, than estrangement hereafter. Better for the fair tree of love to be cut down in its pristine vigour, when the heart may find consolation in the fond remembrance of its beauty, and the perpetual fragrance it has left behind, than for it to flourish awhile only to wither and leave utterly desolate the spot where it had bloomed. Hard and almost impossible as it would be for that young bride to receive a farewell pressure from the hand she loves, and meet for the last time that tender glance which gleams upon her soul like sunshine, it would be less painful than to risk encountering hereafter angry frowns or perhaps cold looks from him. To her now there scarcely appears anything so terrible in the whole worldany anguish would be preferable to such sorrow. She comforts herself, however, with the

and, alas! of transient duration; if left to itself, it will trail along the ground, soiling its blossoms in the dust of earth, instead of towering aloft, radiant in the sunshine of heaven.

They err grievously, who suppose love to be merely a sentiment capable of affording a temporary happiness to the heart, and shedding a little romance over the days of youth; and they err as fatally who suppose it an engrossing passion, tending to enslave the heart and mind, and attach them closer to things of earth. It is neither. It is certainly the source of very great happiness, but it is chiefly valuable as being a means, and one of the most efficacious of means, of enabling us to fulfil the paramount object of life-the benefiting or improving of ourselves and others. Let the young bride then no longer only exult in the powerful feelings of her heart as a source of present happiness, nor only dread lest they become a cause of future sorrow; let her rejoice rather that so precious a means has been confided to her to advance her own rege

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