a struggle, which no pen can describe or tongue can tell. I thought of the pain of dying at night in the forest, alone and untended. I thought how many wearisome and anxious days and nights my wife and children would watch for my return, but never see me more, nor learn my fate, nor ever find my sepulchre beneath the canopy of the woods.

After cool deliberation, as in a decision involving life or death, I sunk upon my knees, and implored that Providence, in whose omnipresent and omniscient existence and omnipotent power I was a firm believer, to give me perfect resignation to his will-to prepare me for the solemnity of dissolution-to enable me confidingly to commit, with my dying breath, all the objects of my affection to his faithfulness and care, and calmly and with Christian fortitude, await the arrival of the summons of the grim messenger.

It was my fervent aspiration, also, to the Great Director of all events, that he would give me strength, if it might be his will, to make one trial more to extricate myself from the mazes of the forest, and that he would guide me in the path of deliverance.

I rose from my knees with my mind calm and resigned. I determined, after another brief effort, if still unsuccessful, to consider it the will of God, and then look around, and find a suitable place where I could lie down and die.

Under a new impulse, as it were, I started off in a little different direction from that in which I had been traveling. To my surprise and encouragement, I perceived that there were no such obstacles in the way as before. I was now apparently in a beaten path. Ere I had proceeded a dozen rods, a rail fence suddenly interposed across my path, the first sign of civilization that had greeted my eyes. And oh, how welcome! My emotions were unutterable. I felt that it was a direct interposition of Providence, to snatch me from expected death, and my heart rose in thankfulness and adoration for his preserving goodness.

Beyond the fence was a clearing, into which I entered, when up started some cows, another sign that I was near the abodes of human beings. Nor did these signs prove fallacious, for discerning a light at a little distance, I found that it proceeded from the hut of a hos

pitable cottager, who welcomed me, and cheerfully administered, so far as he could, to my pressing wants.

But as this communication is already too voluminous, and as it was my original intention only to describe my escape from the perils of the forest, I must now close by merely remarking, that after a long and tedious illness, I barely escaped death, with all the care and attention which kind-hearted sympathy could bestow; which convinces me that, if I had lain in the forest that night, this narrative would never have been written.

The benevolent have the advantage of the envious, even in this present life; for the envious man is tormented not only by all the ill that befalls himself, but by all the good that happens to another; whereas the benevolent man is the better prepared to bear his own calamities unruffled, from the complacency and serenity he has secured from contemplating the prosperity of all around him. The sun of happiness must be totally eclipsed, before it can be total darkness with him! But the envious man is made gloomy, not only by his own cloud, but by another's sunshine. He may exclaim with the poet, "Dark! dark! amidst a blaze of light!" Desperate by his own calamities, and infuriated also by the prosperity of another, he would fain fly to that hell that is beyond him, to escape that which is within. In short, envy is almost the only vice that constantly punishes itself, in the very act of its commitment; and the envious man makes a worse bargain, even than the hypocrite, for the hypocrite serves the devil, without wages-but the envious man serves him, not only without reward, but to be punished also for his pains.

It would be most lamentable if the good things of this world were rendered either more valuable, or more lasting; for, despicable as they already are, too many are found eager to purchase them, even at the price of their souls!

Go, whisper in another's ear

Thy honeyed vows of love,

Which, from thy perjured lips, are heard

And registered above.

I will not curse thee; no, away!

And take thy gifts with thee:
My woman's soul can never bow-
My heart is proud and free.

We part, 'tis well, may heaven grant
Thou ne'er may'st cross my path;
I would not have my spirit moved
To deeper, deadlier wrath!

Drink deep, drink deep of pleasure's cup—

Be ever gay as now

Yet conscience still will mind thee oft

Of this thy BROKEN VOW.

STREAMS FROM A TROUBLED FOUNTAIN.

Original.

BY D. BETHUNE DUFFIELD.

"Therefore I hated life; because the work that is wrought under the sun is grievous unte me; for all is vanity and vexation of spirit."- Eccl. ii. 17.

OUR life-oh! what a mockery!

Its promises how vain

And Pleasure's cup, when lifted up,

How soon hurled down again!

The frenzied grasp may raise it high,
To ease an aching mind,
But should the lip the goblet sip,

What stings are left behind!

Calm glides yon river's tranquil stream

Where moonbeams softly play;

Some silent place beneath its face,

Might wash all woes away!

THE most consistent men are not more unlike to others than they are at times to themselves; therefore, it is ridiculous to see charactermongers drawing a full length likeness of some great man, and perplexing themselves and their readers by making every feature of his conduct strictly conform to those lines and lineaments which they have laid down. They generally find, or make for him, some ruling passion, the rudder of his course: but, with all his pother about ruling passions, the fact is, that all men and women have but one apparent good. Those indeed are the strongest minds, and are capable of the greatest actions, who possess a telescopic power of intellectual vision, enabling them to ascertain the real magnitude and importance of distant good, and to despise those which are indebted for all their grandeur solely to their contiguity.