THOSE EVENING BELLS. THOSE evening bells! those evening bells! Of love and home, and that sweet time Those joyous hours are passed away; And so 'twill be when I am gone; THE MEETING OF THE WATERS. There is not in the wide world a valley so sweet Yet it was not that Nature had shed o'er the scene 'Twas that friends, the beloved of my bosom, were near, Who made every dear scene of enchantment more dear, And who felt how the best charms of nature improve, When we see them reflected from looks that we love. Sweet vale of Avoca! how calm could I rest In thy bosom of shade with the friends I love best, When the storms that we feel in this cold world shall cease, And our hearts, like thy waters, be mingled in peace! THE MINSTREL BOY. The minstrel boy to the war is gone; 66 And his wild harp slung behind him. The minstrel fell; but the foeman's chain Thy songs were made for the pure and the free; THE DEATH OF A YOUNG LADY. I saw thy form in youthful prime, As streams that run o'er golden mines, Nor seem to know the wealth that shines Within their gentle tide, So, veiled beneath the simplest guise, Thy radiant genius shone, And that which charmed all other eyes Seemed worthless in thy own. If souls could always dwell above, SUNSET IN SYRIA. Now upon Syria's land of roses And, like a glory, the broad sun Whose head in wintry grandeur towers, And whitens with eternal sleet, But nought can charm the luckless Peri; Temple of the Sun at Balbec HINDA'S APPEAL. O, ever thus, from childhood's hour, But 'twas the first to fade away. To glad me with its soft black eye, LAMENT OF A PERI FOR HINDA. Farewell-farewell to thee, Araby's daughter; With every thing beauteous that grows in the deep; Each flower of the rock and each gem of the billow Shall sweeten thy bed and illumine thy sleep. Around thee shall glisten the loveliest amber We'll dive where the gardens of coral lie darkling, We'll seek where the sands of the Caspian are sparkling, The Persian Gulf. XLVII.-MIKE FINK, THE LAST OF THE BOATMEN. [This sketch of the last survivor of a race of men now extinct is taken from the Western Souvenir for 1829.] I EMBARKED a few years since, at Pittsburg, for Cincinnati, on board a steamboat, more with a view of realizing the possibility of a speedy return against the current, than in obedience to the call of either business or pleasure. When we left, the season was not far advanced in vegetation. But as we proceeded, the change was more rapid than the difference of latitude justified. I had frequently observed this in former voyages; but it never was so striking as on the present occasion. The old mode of travelling in the sluggish flat-boat seemed to give time for the change of season; but now a few hours carried us into a different climate. We met Spring, with all her laughing train of flowers and verdure, rapidly advancing from the south. The buckeye, cottonwood, and maple had already assumed, in this region, the rich livery of summer. The thousand varieties of the floral kingdom spread a gay carpet over the luxuriant meadows on each side of the river. The thick woods resounded with the notes of the feathered tribe each striving to outdo his neighbor in noise, if not in melody. We had not yet reached the region of paroquets; but the clear-toned whistle of the cardinal was heard in every bush; and the cat-bird was endeavoring, with its usual zeal, to rival the powers of the more gifted mocking-bird. A few hours brought us to one of those stopping points known by the name of "wooding-places." It was situated immediately above Letart's Falls. The boat, obedient to the wheel of the pilot, made a graceful sweep towards the island above the falls, and rounding to, approached the wood pile. As the boat drew near the shore, the escape steam reverberated through the forest and hills like the chafed bellowing of the caged tiger. The root of a tree, concealed beneath the |