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tural file, for which purpose it is used in our manu factures. What a contrast, exclaims the same ingenious botanist, to whom we have been so largely indebted, between this secretion of the tender vegetable frame, and those exhalations which constitute the perfume of flowers! One is among the most permanent substances in nature-an ingredient in the primæval mountains of the globe; the other, the invisible, intangible breath of a moment!

Among the innumerable advantages to be derived from a knowledge of botany, however slight, may be mentioned the perpetual amusement which it affords in scenes which to others might be only productive of ennui; the impressions of pure natural religion which it awakens, and the lofty and ennobling sentiments by which they are invariably associated. Nor do we need for this purpose the garden's artificial embellishments, as the same sensations may be excited, even in a more striking degree, amid the most desolate scenes. Nature in every form is lovely still.

I can admire to ecstasy, although
I be not bower'd in a rustling grove,

Tracing through flowery tufts some twinkling rill,
Or perch'd upon a green and sunny hill,
Gazing upon the sylvanry below,

And harking to the warbling beaks above.—
To me the wilderness of thorns and brambles

Beneath whose weeds the muddy runnel scrambles—
The bald, burnt moor-the marsh's sedgy shallows,
Where docks, bullrushes, waterflags, and mallows,
Choke the rank waste, alike can yield delight.
A blade of silver hair-grass nodding slowly
In the soft wind,-the thistle's purple crown,
The ferns, the rushes tall, and mosses lowly,

A thorn, a weed, an insect, or a stone,
Can thrill me with sensations exquisite,-
For all are exquisite, and every part

Points to the mighty hand that fashion'd it.
Then as I look aloft with yearning heart,

The trees and mountains, like conductors, raise
My spirit upward on its flight sublime;

And clouds, and sun, and heaven's marmorean floor,
Are but the stepping-stones by which I climb

Up to the dread Invisible, to pour

My grateful feelings out in silent praise.

When the soul shakes her wings, how soon we fly
From earth to th' empyrean heights, and tie
The Thunderer to the tendril of a weed.

ADDRESS TO THE MUMMY AT BELZONI'S
EXHIBITION.

AND thou hast walk'd about (how strange a story!)
In Thebes's streets three thousand years ago,
When the Memnonium was in all its glory,
And Time had not begun to overthrow
Those temples, palaces, and piles stupendous,
Of which the very ruins are tremendous.

Speak! for thou long enough hast acted Dummy,
Thou hast a tongue-come-let us hear its tune;
Thou 'rt standing on thy legs, above-ground, Mummy!
Revisiting the glimpses of the moon,

Not like thin ghosts or disembodied creatures,
But with thy bones and flesh, and limbs and features.

Tell us for doubtless thou canst recollect,

To whom should we assign the Sphinx's fame?

Was Cheops or Cephrenes architect

Of either Pyramid that bears his name?

Is Pompey's Pillar really a misnomer?

Had Thebes a hundred gates, as sung by Homer?

Perhaps thou wert a Mason, and forbidden

By oath to tell the mysteries of thy trade,Then say what secret melody was hidden

In Memnon's statue which at sun-rise play'd?
Perhaps thou wert a Priest-if so, my struggles
Are vain, for priestcraft never owns its juggles.

Perchance that very hand, now pinion'd flat,
Has hob-a-nob'd with Pharaoh, glass to glass;
Or dropp'd a halfpenny in Homer's hat,

Or doff'd thine own to let Queen Dido pass;
Or held, by Solomon's own invitation,
A torch at the great Temple's dedication.

I need not ask thee if that hand, when arm'd,
Has any Roman soldier maul'd and knuckled,
For thou wert dead, and buried, and embalm'd,
Ere Romulus and Remus had been suckled :-
Antiquity appears to have begun

Long after thy primeval race was run.

Thou couldst develope, if that wither'd tongue
Might tell us what those sightless orbs have seen,
How the world look'd when it was fresh and young,
And the great deluge still had left it green—
Or was it then so old that History's pages
Contain'd no record of its early ages?

Still silent? incommunicative elf!

Art sworn to secrecy? then keep thy vows;

But prythee tell us something of thyself-
Reveal the secrets of thy prison-house :

Since in the world of spirits thou hast slumber'd,

What hast thou seen-what strange adventures number'd?

Since first thy form was in this box extended,

We have, above-ground, seen some strange mutations The Roman empire has begun and ended,

New worlds have risen-we have lost old nations, And countless kings have into dust been humbled, While not a fragment of thy flesh has crumbled.

Didst thou not hear the pother o'er thy head

When the great Persian conqueror, Cambyses,
March'd armies o'er thy tomb with thundering tread,
O'erthrew Osiris, Orus, Apis, Isis,

And shook the Pyramids with fear and wonder,
When the gigantic Memnon fell asunder?

If the tomb's secrets may not be confess'd,
The nature of thy private life unfold :-

:

: A heart has throbb'd beneath that leathern breast,

And tears adown that dusty cheek have roll'd :-
Have children climb'd those knees, and kiss'd that face?
What was thy name and station, age and race?

Statue of flesh-Immortal of the dead!
Imperishable type of evanescence!

s;

Posthumous man, who quitt'st thy narrow bed,
And standest undecay'd within our presence,
Thou wilt hear nothing till the Judgment morning,
When the great Trump shall thrill thee with its warning.

Why should this worthless tegument endure,

If its undying guest be lost for ever?

O let us keep the soul embalm'd and pure

In living virtue, that when both must sever, Although corruption may our frame consume, Th' immortal spirit in the skies may bloom!

ENGLISH PRIDE.

Here let us fix our foot, hence take our view,
And learn to try false merit by the true.

:

STILLINGFLEET.

YES the English are unquestionably an unsociable people; and I had no sooner discovered the fact, than I proceeded to explore the causes of this antipathy to communicativeness and good fellowship; which, after tracing them through all their ramifications and disguises, I found invariably converging in one little corner of the heart, inscribed with the word-Pride. Bruce was not satisfied when he bestrode the three streams whose union formed the Nile; he would still ascertain which was the highest and most abundant source from which the waters were supplied and in like manner I pursued my researches until I found that the great Pride fountain from which the bitter waters of English reserve pour their petrifying influence, was the pride of Wealth. National pride-pride of birth-of rank-of talent-I had encountered in foreign countries; but this master-folly, which in England swallows up all the rest, appears to be indigenous to the soil, sharing that honour with its congenial products, the crab-apple and the thistle. To a certain extent this feeling may have originated in the absolute necessity for riches, in a country where no man can maintain an establishment, or even move in circles at all elevated above

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