The little devotee clung rapturously to this stolen communion with heaven. She received her celestial guests upon her knees, with clasped hands; she kissed the ground which they touched; she wept at their departure, and crowned their statues in the church. Before, she had taken pleasure in dancing with the villagers, every spring-time, about the old beech tree-the fairy beech near the chapel of the Lady of Vermont; but, after that visitation, she forsook the old sports, and would not sanction an amusement that had grown out of a heathen superstition. No girlish love affair appears ever to have touched her heart, although a subject so much talked of by the village maidens was no stranger to her thoughts, and she kept her virgin freedom only by the most decided refusal of all overtures, maintaining that the two saints had received her vow of virginity, and had promised to lead her to Paradise if she kept the vow. Schiller has departed from the truth of history in ascribing a romantic passion to his heroine, and the Duke of Weimar pleasantly defended this fiction on the ground that those gentlemen, the poets, had a right, like the Creator, to make something out of nothing. Hase well replies that the Creator, who made all things from the beginning, understands also what poetry is, and that the real Maid of Orleans has fought a much severer battle in her own heart than the maiden of the romantic tragedy, and her fate is still more tragic.

Turn from this picture of rural innocence, and look at the fearful strifes that were rending France. The storm that swept over the nation was at last to reach the gentle lily that bloomed unseen in that quiet vale. A constant quarrel between France and England had been kept alive by the fact that the Kings of England, as Dukes of Normandy, were vassals of the French crown, and were constantly tempted to solve the problem of sovereignty by the sword. Driven from the very field of their noted victories, and crowded into a few strongholds on the sea-coast by the rising spirit of French nationality, the English were led to revive all their oid hopes, at the beginning of the 15th century, by the incapacity of the king, and the discord of the royal family, of France. At last Paris was occupied by English troops; and before the judgmentseat of the feeble old king the Dauphin was arraigned for the murder of the Duke of Burgundy, and excluded from the throne, which was made over to the King of England, as the rightful heir. The end

of the Empire of the Lilies seemed near, and France to be destined to become English, without any native sovereign. Soon after, the feeble old king died, Henry V. of England was also taken away, and his son, Henry VI., an infant of nine months, was proclaimed Sovereign of France and England, under the regency of his uncle. The north of France, with Paris, the bourgeoisie, and the Burgundian nobility, saw in the dominion of the English the end of strife; but the south, the country people, and a part of the nobility, stood by the lineal heir, Charles VII., and by the old nationality. It was a dark day for France. A single fact is enough to state. The people of Paris broke into the prisons, murdered all the prisoners, to the number of three thousand, and in one winter night the wolves came into the streets of the city and devoured the carcasses.

At this time Joan d'Arc grew up, and shared all the loyalty so characteristic of her village. There was only one villager there who favored the Burgundian faction; and the Maid confessed afterwards that she would have liked to break his head, if it had pleased God. It is not clear at precisely what time she received the call to devote herself to the nation; but there can be no doubt of the remarkable character of the alleged communications which came to her. The archangel told her, she thought, in the most explicit way, that God has great compassion for the French people-that she was to be a good child, and to go to the aid of their king. Her saints also offered to open the way. Weeping, she said: "I am but a poor maiden, and know nothing of riding or of war." The saints replied that she was to go to Vaucouleurs, where she would find a captain of the royal army, who would lead her to the king. She afterwards said that she did not speak of these voices to any one in Domremy, although it was not forbidden her. Enough of what was going on in her mind, however, escaped her lips to alarm her father, and probably to make him dream about her going away with soldiers-an idea which struck the old man with such horror, that he declared to his son, that he would sooner have her drowned. By stratagem she at last succeeded in escaping to Vaucouleurs with her uncle, under the pretence of taking care of his sick wife. The uncle first, however, named her project to the king's captain there, who told him to give the jade a couple of good boxen ears, and send her home to her father. But she was not to be de

as the prices diminish), and spouters of Racine, and Corneille, and Victor Hugo; scarcely a day elapses, says he, that they do not have Théramène's récit, Augustus's soliloquy, Athalie's dream, or the soliloquy of Charles V. Then the names of the dishes are, or rather were, before the coup d'état, very odd; there was soup à la Robespierre; beef à la Marat; mutton ragout à la fraternité; chicken à la Republique, and heaven knows what other democratical names. You had but to ask one of the frequenters for his favorite dishes to divine his politics: tell me your dinner, I tell you who you are. You saw there, as you see at places like it in Paris, all the stone-masons and plasterers of the neighborhood; one would think their trades indurated their bellies as hard as their hands, for the 'serpent' says they partake freely of all the dishes of the place, without giving immediate symptoms of discomfort."

"The restaurant you and Louis dined at the other day," said Madame, “was a very different sort of place from the gargotte of the Barrière de Mont Rouge, wasn't it?" "Yes, indeed! And you must some day dine at the Trois Frères with us. It is more than worth the vulgar money you pay for the dinner, large as is the amount of the bill. The Trois Frères is unquestionably the best eating-place in the world; it occupies the rank the Rocher de Cancale, Very's, and Véfour's held some twenty years ago. You remember the account Tom Moore gives of them in the book from which I read to you the other night--and De Balzac's description of the Rocher de Cancale, may be justly applied to a dinner party in the salon up stairs of the Trois Frères: at half-past seven, a magnificent service of plate, made expressly for the dinners, where vanity pays the bill with bank notes, shone upon the table of the handsomest salon of the establishment where all Europe has dined. Torrents of light made cascades on the edges of the carvings of the silver and the glass. Waiters-a stranger would have taken for diplomatists, but for their age-behaved themselves with all the seriousness of people who know themselves to be extra paid.' We will all dine there together New Year's Day. I will go there in the morning and order a soup parée du gibier (the only thing we need order beforehand), and retain one of those cosy little rooms on the entresol so well sofaed, and cushioned, and lighted, and at night I'll introduce you to all their delicate luxuries, from the soup to the grapes, without omitting a bechamel de

turbot, their famous fricandeau, their cocks' combs, their truffles, their wonderful salmis of game, and those thousand other made dishes the genius of Vatel and Careme have given to their successors. You may judge then for yourself of the splendor of the service, and the excellence of the viands, and the genius of the cooks, and the polished obsequiousness of the carefully dressed waiters. But-for the privacy of the cabinet de société has some drawbacks-you must consent to lose the splendor of the ground-floor room, and the bril liant company generally assembled there."

"I will pay for the dinner on condition you tell me all the news about the fashions-I want to hear all the news, and I shall be exacting, for Louis has told me that you live with the best mantuamaker of Paris."

The return of

"Ah! most willingly. necklaces is spoken of as certain this winter in the fashionable circles, and hair ornaments are much sought after for necklaces, ear-rings and bracelets. The workmanship is beautiful, and the effect extremely good. Fichus, worn with redingotes, and high dresses, have almost invariably the cal mousquetaire trimmed with Mechlin or Valenciennes lace. Small tucks are much in favor for tulle or muslin chemisettes; but whilst there can be nothing prettier when new, they are generally spoilt in the washing; to obviate this, narrow flat braid is run into each tuck, which gives firmness, and keeps them in their straight lines. Lace berthes are much in favor; application, guipure, or Alençon, are most in demand, they are fastened with narrow ribbons or ends of lace, called bons hommes: the trimmings to the sleeves and flounces match the lace, of which the berthe is composed. Brooches are much worn, to fasten the berthe on the front of the body. Winter-pardessus are occupying the attention of our most skilful artists, but nothing very definite has been as yet decided on. It may, however, be mentioned, that velvet trimmed with deep lace will be worn for full dress, the pelisse for morning dress, the Talma cut on the bias, and the manteau Baridant, in cloth and trimined with velvet braids for promenades. The sorties de bal are very elegant; the most distinguées are made of white poult de soie, lined with pink or blue satin. A large hood lined with plush to match the satin, with a full bow and long ends, is indispensable, and Illyrian sleeves complete this useful and beautiful manteau. Taffetas glacés dresses, with three skirts

banks of the Loire, through that garden of France, in the very bloom of spring; and preceded by chanting priests, and escorting large herds of cattle for victualling the city, the army had the appearance of a peaceful pilgrimage. What poet could create a scene more expressive of whatever was noblest and fairest in those old ages of chivalry and devotion! It was but the faith of the times incarnated in one whose sex and purity every Ave Maria had taught the people to adore; it was the spirit of the prevalent Mary-worship carried from the sanctuary into the camp. and stirring the fiercest of passions by the gentlest of affections. Need we say that this vision of light must go out in darkness, and that nothing but a perpetual miracle could keep a human creature upon the ethereal height where Joanna stood? The story of her destiny is too familiar to repeat. Soon Orleans called her its deliverer, and there, and in other cities in quick succession, the lilies of France waved loyally from towers so lately insulted by the invader's flag. In spite of all opposition, the Maid insisted upon pushing to Rheims; she stood with her banner by the altar at the coronation of the Dauphin, and was first to kneel at his feet after he received the crown. This was the meridian of her glory. This simple girl of Domremy was now the foremost personage of France, and history itself plays the artist in telling us that her father, and brother, and uncle were witnesses of her honors, contrasting thus by their presence the splendors of the Court with the simplicity of her native home.

As rapidly as her success her downfall came.

Who does not know of her rash attack upon Paris, the misgivings that began to question her inspiration, and the series of disasters. ending in her capture at Compiegne, and her execution in 1431. Never did grim inquisitors doom to death a fairer victim by baser arts; and never did a holier light shine out from the crackling fires of a martyr's pile, than when this lily of France was cast into the flames. The attendant priest heard her, as the fire was doing its deadly work, invoke her saints-and her last word was her Saviour's name. The cross afterwards planted upon the place of execution at Rouen was a fitting memorial of her self-sacrifice, and of the penitence of her murderers.

Never more interest was attached to the character of Joan d'Arc, as a philosophical study, than now. It is very easy to call her a half-crazy enthusiast,

and set down her story in the vulgar annals of superstition. But the candor and good sense of our age seeks a worthier solution, and no fair-minded student of history is willing to allow so interesting a chapter to pass by without connecting its lessons with some traits of our common nature. The Maid of Orleans was a human creature like ourselves, and the mind which in her was so strangely moved was essentially the same organ that we possess. That she was an impostor no sane thinker will now assert, for it would be far more remarkable for an ignorant, sensitive girl to carry out such an imposture in the camp and Court, at the altar, and even at the stake, than to have received the supernatural commission which she claimed. Nor do we explain the chief fact in her career when we ascribe her influence over France to the force of religious and martial enthusiasm, so inflamed by her pretensions or her faith. She herself is the great problem, and we cannot settle it without some due recognition of the emotional powers of our nature in connection with religious influences. Nothing can be clearer than that she thought she saw visions and heard voices which moved her to her most conspicuous acts. We do not mean to say that there were external objects corresponding with those vows and visions; but that such impressions as she insisted upon declaring were actually made upon her perceptive organs. Before her inquisitors, when severely threatened, she sometimes wavered in asserting this; but her misgiving at last wholly ceased, and in prison and at the stake she maintained the reality of the communications. Now we do not feel bound to explain all the strange experiences of the soul any more than the strange phenomena of Nature, and we are ready to allow that there are many dark nooks and corners in the human mind, in spite of the doctors and metaphysicians. We may nevertheless connect Joanna's visitations with those of a large class of minds similarly constituted, and who are still to be found. The old devotees thought little of hearing voices and of seeing visions in the open day, and a man of exact science like Swedenborg could be as familiar with the people of his day-dream land as with his acquaintance in the street or social circle, noting down the words of Plato or Luther as readily as his own table-talk. It is very clear that if, in the ordinary state of the system, external objects are needed to act upon the nerves of sight and hearing, there may be an extraordinary state of the system in which internal

convictions or emotions convey external impressions, or affect the organs of sense precisely like external objects. There is no more decided illustration of this fact than the case of the English artist, Blake, who died in 1812. In youth his powers had been severely tasked, and through life his days were given to the most engrossing labor. His ideal faculty, so little exercised by the drudgery of engraving and ordinary painting, would revel in a world of its own, and when the day's work was done, he hurried to the interview with his phantasmal guests, by the sea-shore, as eagerly as a bon vivant goes to his boon companions. He met the shades of Pindar, Virgil, Dante, and Milton, and so distinct was the impression upon his senses, that he frequently made sketches of their features.-and in one case he wrote down a poem dictated to him by Milton-a poem not extant in Milton's lifetime, and apparently bearing the same relation to his muse that would be expected by all who are familiar with the recent issue of poetry and prose from the mighty spirits that wait upon the rapping conclave. In another instance he saw the form of the hero Wallace, and while sketching him, he was interrupted by the shade of Edward I., who disappeared too soon to admit of a complete sketch, and allowed him to go on with the Scotch hero's portrait. This artist's experience certainly illustrates a law of the human constitution, of which every day-dreamer has some slight knowledge, and it enables us to explain without miracle Joanna's voices and visions of angels and saints. The thought that so haunted her mind may have projected itself before her senses in the form of the saint nearest her affections. Bred up in one of the strongholds of ancient loyalty, her devotion may have been influenced by the familiar fegend that a woman of Lorraine was to be the deliverer of France; and her nerves, so delicate from her habits of fasting, may have readily lent their service to her fancy, like the chemist's silvered plate presented to the play of the solar light. She did not claim preternatural guidance upon all subjects; but only in what concerned her main duty to France, and the salvation of her soul. If in many points her alleged visitants left her in darkness, it must be allowed that some of their predetons and promises were remarkably 1. Sel. Let us bear in mind, however, the fact that their communications turned yose commanding idea, and all the power of her contagious enthusiasm would therefore tend to turn promise into pro

phecy by securing the result indicated. Hase sagaciously remarks that this angel -this Saint Catherine-is her own high soul unconscious of itself, like the dæmon of Socrates; hence she was led by her counsels, and she said very naïvely of her saints-"I am always of their opinion." We are not disposed to deny the many instances of wonderful presentiment which history and biography record. With all our explanation of Joanna's mission upon the ground of known principles, she remains still a wonderful creature of God, and an aureola of mystical light still lingers about her head. We understand enough of her to claim a place for her among the daughters of men, and to discern in her, traits that are acting still upon the destinies of our race. career proves how much stronger the emotions are than the calculating understanding, and that still, as of old, "out of the heart are the issues of life." She was not a perfect saint without human temper and foibles. She had her little fits of pettishness, and could sometimes scold, like others of her sex, railing at the English as a set of God-dams, as she usually called them, and threatening to kill the Hussites in a bunch if they did not return to the true faith. It is precisely this natural impulsiveness-this mingling of childish naïveté with heroic inspirationthat gives her the chief hold upon our wonder and admiration.

Her

Our idea would be fitly carried out by adding to this sketch of the Maid of Orleans some description of two characters unlike her, and unlike each other except in the point of their reputation as prophetic leaders. We mean Savonarola, whose majestic presence so long saved Florence from aristocratic oppression and democratic license, and who under his monkish garb bore to the scaffold in 1498 the seeds of religious liberty which Luther afterwards planted broadcast among the nations; and to step forward nearly a half century in time and to descend infinitely in the moral scale, we mean also John of Leyden, the tailor prophet and king of the Anabaptists of Munster, who, amid his seraglio of sixteen wives, mingled a sincere fanaticism with the most monstrous self-indulgence, and like the Apostles of Mormonism, sent out disciples to summon the world to allegiance from a court rivaling the Turk's in licentiousness. But we cannot enter into these subjects now without going beyond our limit, and we have said enough to indicate our purpose and illustrate its main idea.

When we read these and the like pas

MY first view of Hayti was from off the

"Mole St. Nicholas," the northwest point of the island. We were perhaps twenty miles east of the point to be doubled in order to enter the bay of Port au Prince. A bold, mountainous shore presented itself as far as the eye could reach, and far in the interior we could see the cloud-capt summit of "Monte au Diable," towering more than five thousand feet above us. Being awakened suddenly from sound sleep it was as if the island had sprung in an instant, by magic, from the depths of the wide waste of waters by which we had been for many days surrounded.

The scenes of that early morning hour are engraved indelibly upon my memory, and are among the most pleasing reminiscences of my life. Daylight had but just dawned, and the bold shore towered before me draped in the gray morning mist, and covered with a wealth of verdure such as I had never seen before. There is a luxuriance, we can almost say a prodigality in the robes with which nature here decks herself, that amazes and bewilders one who, for the first time, opens his eyes upon a tropical scene. The air was more delightful than I had ever imagined that of the most genial climes to be. I stood hatless, near the stern of the ship, gazing spellbound upon the scene before me; and as we were borne along by a gentle breeze, the mild soft winds played with my, as yet, uncombed locks, and fanned me with a gentle dalliance, even the memory of which is delicious.

Doubling the "Mole" we sailed in a southeasterly direction down the bay, about a hundred miles, to the city of Port au Prince. A range of bold highlands skirts the shore, now with bald and jagged summits, burning and glowing under a tropical sun, and now retreating farther into the interior, and covered with the most rank and luxuriant vegetation.

In going down the bay we pass a beautiful little island about twenty miles in length, called Gonare. Nature has lavished upon it her bounties with the same rich profusion that characterizes all her works here. Mahogany, logwood, tropical fruits, and other productions abound, and it seems a fit residence for fairies; yet no human being is allowed to dwell upon it. Passing this island we were in full view of both shores of the bay, which present the same magnificent appearance. Near the city of Port au Prince the bay

is dotted with several little islands, which, however, add more to its beauty as a scene for a painter, than to its convenience or safety for purposes of navigation. The mountain ranges terminate nearly with the bay, and a level country opens up beyond the city which lies at its head.

Thus much for Haitian scenery; now for an introduction to the people. As we near the city a boat approaches, rowed by two blacks, hatless and with a scanty allowance of clothing, bringing a more respectably attired personage not less black. It is the pilot. As soon as a pilot touches the deck of a vessel, he is in full command; the responsibility of the captain is at an end, and he is only as a passenger. It was very amusing to watch the queer and comical expressions upon the faces of our sailors when their new superior came on board, took his station, and gave his orders, "Port," "Steady," "Starboard," &c. It was evidently not easy for them to yield him all the respect due to his station; but certain significant looks from the captain kept all in order, and we were taken safely to the harbor. Soon another boat came alongside, and we were boarded by three other officials. These were the captain of the port, rather a short stout man (a thorough black), in military dress, composed of a flat crescentshaped cap, epaulet, blue broadcloth coat with figured gilt buttons, &c. Next came the captain of the pilots, a tall well formed man, in official dress. He had spent some time in the United States and now acts as interpreter, the French being the language of the country. And last, the clerk of the port, a young man several shades lighter, in citizen's dress of the latest Parisian style. Broadway does not often furnish a more perfect" exquisite." These received the ship's papers, went through the forms of entry to the custom-house, and placed a black soldier on board as a guard against smuggling. The captain and myself (the only passenger) were then conducted ashore to "La Place," the office of the governor of the city, where after registering our names. and going through a brief form, we were dismissed and at liberty to go on shore when and where we pleased.

The first few hours spent upon any foreign shore will not easily be forgotten. When after an hour or two I was again on board of the vessel for the night, my mind seemed to have been moved and excited by more new and strange emotions,