"I had prepared a brief memorial of the considerations which justified our abandonment of the vessel, and had read it as part of my address. I now fixed it to a stanchion near the gangway, where it must attract the notice of any who might seek us hereafter, and stand with them as my vindication for the step, in case we should be overtaken by disaster. It closed with these words: "I regard the abandonment of the brig as inevitable. We have by actual inspection but thirty-six days provisions, and a careful survey shows that we cannot cut more firewood without rendering our craft unseaworthy. A third Winter would force us, as the only means of escaping starvation, to resort to Esquimaux habits, and give up all hope of remaining by the vessel and her resources. It would therefore in no manner advance the search after Sir John Franklin. "Under any circumstances, to remain longer would be destructive to those of our little party who have already suffered from the extreme severity of the climate and its tendencies to disease. Scurvy has enfeebled more or less every man in the expedition; and an anomalous spasmodic disorder, allied to tetanus, has cost us the life of two of our most prized comrades. I hope, speaking on the part of my companions and myself, that we have done all that we ought to do to prove our tenacity of purpose and devotion to the cause which we have undertaken. This attempt to escape by crossing the southern ice on sledges is regarded by me as an imperative duty-the only means of saving ourselves and preserving the laboriously earned results of the expe dition. E. K. KANE, Com. Grinnell Expedition. "ADVANCE, RENSSELAER BAY, May 20, 1855.'" "We then went upon deck; the flags were hoisted and hauled down again, and our party walked once or twice around the brig, looking at her timbers and exchanging comments upon the scars which reminded them of every stage of her dismantling. Our figure-head-the fair Augusta, the little blue girl, with pink cheeks, who had lost her breast by an iceberg and her nose by a nip off Bedeviled Beach-was taken from our bows and placed aboard the Hope. 'She is, at any rate, wood,' said the men, when I hesitated about giving them the additional burden; and if we cannot carry her far, we can burn her.' "No one thought of the mockery of cheers; we had no festival-liquor to mislead our perception of the real state of things. When all hands were quite ready, we scrambled off over the ice together, much like a gang of stevedores going to work over a quay full of broken cargo. “On reaching the boats, the party were regularly mustered, and divided between the two. A rigid inspection was had of every article of personal equipment. Each man had a woolen underdress and an Esquimaux suit of fur clothing-kapetah, nessak, and nannooke complete, with boots of our own make; that is to say, one pair of canvas faced with walrus-hide, and another inside made of the cabin Brussels carpet. In addition to this, each carried a rueraddy adjusted to fit him comfortably, a pair of socks next his skin, and a pair of large goggles for snow-blindness, made Esquimaux fashion by cutting a small slit in a piece of wood. Some of us had gutta percha masks fitting closely to the face, as large as an ordinary domino; but these were still less favorable to personal appearance than the goggles. The provision-bags and other stores were numbered, and each man and officer had his own bag and a place assigned for it, to prevent confusion in rapid stowing and unstowing. "Excluding four sick men, who were unable to move, and myself, who had to drive the dogteam and serve as common carrier and courier. we numbered but twelve men-which would have given six to a sledge, or too few to move it. It was, therefore, necessary to concentrate our entire force upon one sledge at a time. On the other hand, however, it was important to the efficiency of our organization that matters of cooking, sleeping, baggage and rations should be regulated by separate messes. "The routine I established was the most precise: daily prayers both morning and evening, all hands gathering round in a circle and standing uncovered during the short exercise; regulated hours; fixed duties and positions at the track lines and on the halt; the cooking to be taken by turns, the captains of the boats alone being excused. The charge of the log was confided to Dr. Hayes, and the running survey to Mr. Sontag. Though little could be expected from either of these gentlemen at this time, I deemed it best to keep up the appearance of ordinary voyaging; and after we left the first ices of Smith's Straits I was indebted to them for valuable results. The thermometer was ob served every three hours. "To my faithful friend and first officer, Boatswain Brooks, I assigned the command of the boats and sledges. I knew how well he was fitted for it; and when forced, as I was after. ward during the descent, to be in constant motion between the sick-station, the Esquimaux settlements and the deserted brig, I felt safe in the assurance of his tried fidelity and indomitable resolution. The party under him was marshalled at the rue-raddies as a single gang; but the messes were arranged with reference to the two whale-boats, and when we came afterward to the open water the crews were distributed in the same way. With this organization we set out on our march." ANSON BURLINGAME. THE subject of this sketch occupies a wide space in the public eye. In the vigor of early inanhood, he has sprung suddenly upon the arena, like Minerva from the brain of Jupiter, armed complete in the polished helmet of reason and the glittering panoply of eloquence, to do battle for the awards of untarnished chivalry and undaunted moral courage. His brief career has thus far been brilliant and heroic, and he has already concentrated upon himself, as the center of a sublime moral spectacle, the fixed and earnest gaze of a vast concourse of his fellow countrymen. Few persons have, at so early a period of life, produced such strong and wide undulations in the current of popular sentiment. If he possess the requisite elements to meet the ardent anticipations of his friends, excited by his lofty and gallant bearing, his future career will render him illustrious as an honor to his country and an ornament to his race. Mr. Burlingame, in his present position, is no ordinary man. Whether his attitude has been the result of fortuitous circumstances, adroitly wielded to advantage, or is the normal condition of the man born to stand among the dis tinguished few in the front rank of this progressive age, leading the way to a higher state of social and civic harmony, and exhibiting a more full expression of the Divine image, the future will attest. We view him as a human being suddenly coming up from the jungles of Having completed his elementary studies his native forests, and ere the "exuvia" of the and obtained license to practice in the courts of chase and the rude implements of frontier hus-law, he soon after opened an office in Boston, bandry are discarded, exhibiting such graceful and secured at once, by his assiduity and effifeats of moral "athlete" as give abundant ciency, a successful practice in his profession. promise of future renown. We offer no apology and soon took rank with the distinguished sofor placing him in our gallery of distinguished licitors and counsellors of his adopted State. citizens. Soon after becoming established in business he married an amiable and accomplished daughter of Isaac Livermore, Esq., an eminent merchant of Boston. Anson Burlingame was born about the year 1820, on an Indian reservation, in Western Ohio. His father was, at the time, an officer of the United States army, stationed in that In 1854 our hero was elected to represent the wilderness country to protect the incipient Charlestown district in the United States Conscattered settlements from falling a prey to gress. Hitherto his labors had been confined their Aboriginal neighbors. Of his childhood mainly to professional business, to private litand early youth we have little knowledge. We erary pursuits, and to occasional discussions of infer, however, from his position as a tenant important truths in popular assemblies, when of the wilderness, that his early scholastic priv-called by his fellow-citizens to ascend the pubileges were extremely meager. Almost from lic "tribunal" in defense of popular rights, or infancy, he was accustomed to find his way over the prairies and among the forests in pursuit of game. His dog and rifle, and, haply, a friendly Indian, were his ordinary companions. Thus was he inured to toil, hardened to endurance, and accustomed to danger. Wild and strange Indians he approached without timidity, and made them participants of his sports. Bears, and wolves, and catamounts were the objects of his pursuit, and whether attended or alone he felt himself equal to any encounter with these ferocious beasts of prey. Trained up according to the usages of Western frontier life, | constituents, at whatever sacrifice of personal with his rifle constantly at his side, either as a weapon of attack or defense, he early acquired great skill in its use, so that he rarely missed his aim. His reputation in this respect has not been without its subsequent use, and in one instance, when challenged to the field of honor, his antagonist is said to have adopted the prudential sentiment that "discretion is the better part of valor," and avoided the deadly encounter. During the memorable Presidential campaign of 1840, being then twenty years of age, he was pursuing the study of the law at Detroit, and took the stump to advocate the election of General Harrison. His general intelligence, strong perceptive powers, and ready volubility of speech gave interest to his efforts, and his reputation was at once established as an extraordinarily eloquent and promising young man. We soon after find him in the Law School, in Cambridge, Massachusetts; and in 1844, while yet a student, he took the stump for Henry Clay in that State, and greatly extended his reputation as a forcible, logical reasoner and a fascinating rhetorical speaker. VOL. III-35. in the furtherance of the great interests of human progress and social refinement. Unostentacious in manner and retiring in social habits, whatever he undertook he did well-whether acting for the public, for his clients or for the private interests of himself alone. But on entering into an official position, he felt that all his private interests and aspirations must be made a sacrifice on the altar of the public good. Thus he entered upon his public duties with a perfect abandon of self, and a full determination to sustain the rights and interests of his considerations or at whatever hazard of consequences. In the exciting and all-absorbing conflict between the antagonistic interests of free and slave labor, sustained respectively by the two great parties of the country, he planted himself boldly upon the liberal platform of his constituents, in perfect harmony with his own feelings, and sustained himself with such power of argument and such intrepidity of tactics as to array against him the entire force of the antagonistic party, sagaciously judging if they could silence his batteries, the citadel of the opposition must surrender at discretion. In this arduous and protracted struggle our hero achieved laurels rarely accorded to a political gladiator. On one occasion the Hon. Mr. Brooks, of South Carolina, writhing under the force of well-attested facts and logical deductions, chose to assume the attitude of injured innocence, and challenged Mr. Burlingame to mortal combat. Our hero promptly accepted the challenge, contrary to the usual custom of New England representatives, and, in order to avoid intermeddling officials, named the Clifton House, in Canada, as the place of meeting. Mr. Brooks, doubtless from prudential motives, chose to regard the trouble of repairing to Canada as too great a sacrifice for the pleasure of a little sport in shooting; and, without suggesting to his antagonist a shadow of objection, instead of meeting him in Canada, blowed the matter in the public journals. Thus ended this exciting duel, not entirely without harmful consequences; for one of the parties will always be considered a little lop-winged by chivalrous advocates of the "code of honor." Dueling has ever been repugnant to the moral sense of New England; yet the peculiar circumstances of this case, and its comic end, seems to have so far palliated the offense that on his subsequent appearance upon the stump Mr. Burlingame has been everywhere hailed with unwonted enthusiasm, and has lately been reëlected to Congress for a second term. Then cried a harusper aloud, That all the crowd might hear, "We've viewed the entrails, sought the shrine, And now it seemeth clear And never perish, when She gives the earth her noblest gift, Much marveled then the Romans, "What is Rome's best and noblest gift? What can this offering be? Is't money, temples, images? Or primal spoils from fallen foes Young Marcus Curtius, passing by, Better than arms and noble youth Would make that cave his sepulcher, And make her power complete. They, wondering, stood in silence, Thus passed he on; with reverence For which he now must die; That stood in silence there, He clasped his hands in prayer To gods above, to gods below, The Lares, too, of Rome, That they would grant him passage safe And grant to Rome eternity, And ever-growing fame. He looked upon the yawning chasm And waved his gleaming sword on high Then dashed the spurs into his steed, Then cried aloud the priests of Rome, Bring forth the first fruits of your soil, And pour them o'er his head, And offer an oblation Unto the pious dead." With joyful haste the people ran To do as they were taught, And brought their corn and oil and wine, And stopped to check a tear, And seemed they all as if they decked And each in solemn accents cried, As they slowly turned away, "O, where hath Rome another son Like him we mourn to-day? WOMAN'S RIGHTS.-We know no rights of women that are separated from the rights of man. There is no injury inflicted upon the one that does not recoil upon the other. If the Turk keeps woman in abject slavery, the Turk himself becomes a degenerate slave. [London Leader. PETALESHAROO. THIS remarkable brave was a Pawnee, and was born within the bounds of that tribe about 1795-6. [A brave is one remove below a chief, and a warrior one below a brave.] He was the son of Letelesha, the principal chief of the Pawnees, and commonly known as the knife chief, and was noted for the noble symmetry of his person, his prowess in the chase, and his undaunted and romantic courage. In Major Long's expedition to the Rocky Mountains, in 1819-20, he became acquainted with Petalesharoo, and it was through his influence that this young brave was induced to visit Washington, in 1821, with a large delegation of his tribe. Dr. Morse, in his "Indian Report," gives the following anecdote of this gallant savage, which excites our highest admiration, and shows that the most refined and Christian sentiments are sometimes concealed beneath a red skin: "At the age of twenty-one he was so dis. tinguished by his abilities and prowess that he was called the 'bravest of the braves.' But a few years previous to 1821 it was a custom, not I only with his nation, but those adjacent, to tor. ture and burn captives as sacrifices to the Great Star. In an expedition performed by some of his countrymen against the Iteans, a female was taken, who, on their return, was doomed to suffer according to their usages. She was fastened to the stake, and a vast crowd assembled upon the adjoining plain to witness the scene. This brave, unobserved, had stationed two fleet horses at a small distance, and was seated among the crowd as a silent spectator. All were anxiously waiting to enjoy the spectacle of the first contact of the flames with their victim, when, to their astonishment, a brave was seen rending asunder the cords which bound her, and, with the swiftness of thought, bearing her in his arms beyond the amazed multitude, where, placing her upon one horse, and mounting himself upon the other, he bore her off safe to her friends and country. This act would have endangered the life of an ordinary chief; but such was his sway in the tribe that no one presumed to censure the daring act." |