many derive from a year or two spent in foreign lands. Only an hour is required for us to ascend the Mississippi with Banvard, from New Orleans to St. Louis, a journey of three or four days by steamboat. We thus effect a great saving of time, and avoid all the discomforts of travel, as well as the danger of snags and explosions. We sit quietly at our ease, and without leaving our chair make the whole journey of a thousand miles. This is certainly one of the greatest labor-saving inventions of this inventing age. Some years ago, by walking only as far as Washington Street, I ascended the Rhine, and made myself familiar with its vine-clad hills, its picturesque scenery, the ruins of its ancient castles, so famous in history, and still more famous in the descriptions of Byron. For twenty-five cents I traversed the whole length of that wondrous stream, that attracts its pilgrims from the remotest corners of the world.

I have recently made a voyage to the Polar regions, under the guidance of a noble specimen of humanity, William Morton, of whom it is enough to say that he was worthy to be the companion and friend of Dr. Kane. He was born in Ireland, and does honor to the land that gave him birth. With him I entered the region of icebergs, towering hundreds of feet above the sea, and threatening the "Advance" more than once with instant destruction. We passed the Crimson Cliffs, and after many hair-breadth escapes

the brig settled down in her winter quarters and final resting place. There I had a fine view of the observatory, surrounded with immense blocks of ice, which rendered the approach to it difficult if not dangerous. After witnessing the miraculous escape of the party from danger and cold, and the igloe, or Esquimaux hut, where Dr. Kane and Hans lay two days in total darkness, I started with Mr. Morton, Hans, and seven dogs, for a trip to the North. Travelling some two hundred miles, we were surprised and delighted with a view of the open Polar Sea, the existence of which had been suggested by Lieut. Maury and by Dr. Kane. Passing through many scenes in and around the vessel, during two long Polar nights, I saw the feeble band worn down by sickness, and almost in despair, commence their last and desperate struggle for life. Nothing but the superhuman energy of Dr. Kane could have carried them through that journey, which, after innumerable dangers, they accomplished in about eighty days, travelling a distance of fourteen hundred miles.

In moral sublimity this retreat stands far before that of Bonaparte from the burning ruins of Moscow, and will be read with thrilling interest as long as our language endures. Returning from my journey, I was introduced to Mr. Morton and the dog Etah, the only survivor of the seven, without whose assistance not one of the party could have survived to tell the

tale of disaster and death. I felt much refreshed and benefited by the journey, and was surprised to find how little it had cost of money, labor or time. I had been introduced to the most stupendous and awful of nature's works, become acquainted with the simplest, rudest, and most ignorant and debased of the human species, and at the same time witnessed the noblest exhibition of heroism of which man is capable in his high state of civilization and refinement. I had seen science and human energy in deadly struggle with the forces of nature, and seen them come off victorious. A thousand years may never exhibit another spectacle like this, and we cannot but hope that with the present expedition, at least, set on foot by the unconquerable hope of Lady Franklin, all Polar expeditions may end. Life is too precious to be thus sacrificed, even in the cause of science. It is pretty well settled that no practical use can ever be made of the long-sought northwest channel, now it has been discovered by Capt. McClure.

Ir often happens that when I visit the theatre I find myself moralizing on the life of an Actor. Why is it, I ask, that we hold him in so little esteem who both caters for our amusement and furnishes lessons for our intellectual and moral improvement, who "holds, as it were, the mirror up to nature, shows virtue her own feature, scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time his form and pressure."

Is there anything undignified in exhibiting for our instruction or amusement the counterfeit presentment of real life? This is what the novelist does with his pen, and why should he be better received than the actor, who does the same in his person? There have always been exceptions, it is true, in favor of those who have greatly distinguished themselves in the mimic art; but still, actors, as a class, are condemned to a sort of proscription, as though, however respectable they may be in point of character, they had no right to claim an equal rank in the society to which they belong.