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And pointed, as she made reply,
Towards that long perspective
Of years to come, in distant blue,
Wherein she meant to live and do.

"Alas," says she, "how hard your toil,
With undiverted sadness:

Behold yon land of wine and oil,--
Those sunny hills of gladness;
Those joys I wait with eager brow,'
"And so you always will," said Now,

"That fairy land, that looks so real,
Recedes as you pursue it ;
Thus while you wait for times ideal,
I take my work and do it ;
Intent to form, when time is gone,
A pleasant past to look upon."

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We must not indulge in further citations; and yet, there is one poem which, equally on account of the theme, and the manner in which it is treated, we cannot pass over. It is the tender and touching effusion of a genial spirit on visiting the garden and summer-house of Cowper.

On VISITING COWPER'S GARDEN, and SUMMER HOUSE at OLNEY.

Are these the trees ---Is this the place?
These roses, did they bloom for him?
Trod he these walks with thoughtful pace?
Pass'd he amid these borders trim !

Is this the bower?---a bumble shed
Methinks it seems for such a guest ?
Why rise not columns, dome-bespread,
By art's elaborate fingers drest?

Art waits on wealth ;---there let her roam---
Her fabrics rear, her temples gild:
But Genius, when he seeks a home,
Must send for Nature's self to build.

This quiet garden's humble bound,
This homely roof, this rustic fane,
With playful tendrils twining round,
And woodbines peeping at the pane :---

That tranquil, tender sky of blue,
Where clouds of golden radiance skim,
Those ranging trees of varied hue---
These were the sights that solaced him.

We stept within :---at once on each
A feeling steals, so undefined;
In vain we seek to give it speech---
'Tis silent homage paid to Mind.

They tell us here he thought and wrote,
On this low seat---reclining thus;

Ye garden breezes, as ye float,

Why bear ye no such thoughts to us?

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Perhaps the balmy air was fraught
With breath of heaven ;---or did he toil
In precious mines of sparkling thought
Conceal'd beneath the curious soil?

Did zephyrs bear on golden wings
Rich treasures from the honied dew?
Or are there here celestial springs
Of living waters whence he drew?

And here he suffer'd !---this recess,
Where even Nature fail'd to cheer,
Has witness'd oft his deep distress,
And precious drops have fallen here!

Here are no richly sculptured urns
The consecrated dust to cover;

But Nature smiles and weeps, by turns,

In memory of her fondest lover.

THE COMPLAINT OF THE DYING YEAR.
AN ALLEGORY. BY JANE TAYLOR.

Reclining on a couch of fallen leaves, wrapped in fleecy mantle, with withered limbs, hoarse voice, and snowy beard, appears a venerable old man. His pulse heats feebly, his breath becomes shorter; he exhibits every mark of approaching dissolution.

This is old Eighteen Hundred and Seventeen; and as every class of readers must remember him a young man, as rosy and blithesome as themselves, they will, perhaps, feel interested in hearing some of his dying expressions, with a few particulars of his past life. His existence is still likely to be prolonged a few days by the presence of his daughter December, the last and sole survivor of his twelve fair children; but it is thought the_father and daughter will expire together. The following are some of the expressions which have been taken down as they fell from his dying lips :--

"I am," said he, "the son of old father Time, and the last of a numerous progeny ; for he has had no less than five thousand eight hundred and seventeen of us; but it has ever been his fate to see one child expire before another was born. It is the opinion of some, that his own constitution is beginning to break up, and that, when he has given birth to a hundred or two more of us, his family will be complete, and then he himself will be no more.'

Here the Old Year called for his account book, and turned over the pages with a sorrowful eye. He has kept, it appears, an accurate account of the moments, minutes, hours, and months which he has issued, and subjoined, in some places, memorandums of the uses to which they have been applied, and of the losses he has sustained. These particulars it would be tedious to detail, and perhaps the recollection of the reader may furnish them as well or better; but we must notice one circumstance; upon turning to a certain page in his accounts, the old man was much affected, and the tears streamed down his furrowed cheeks as he examined it. This was the register of the forty-eight Sundays which he had issued and which, of all the wealth he had to dispose of, has been, it appears, the most scandalousty wasted. "These," said he, "were my most precious gifts. I had but fifty-two of the

to bestow. Alas! how lightly have they been esteemed!" Here, upon referring back to certain old memorandums, he found a long list of vows and resolutions, which had a particular reference to these fifty-two Sundays. This with a mingled emotion of grief and anger, he tore into a hundred pieces, and threw them on the embers, by which he was endeavouring to warm his shivering limbs.

"I feel, however," said he, "more pity than indignation towards these offenders, since they were far greater enemies to themselves than to me. But there are a few outrageous ones, by whom I have been defrauded of so much of my substance, that it is difficult to think of them with patience, particularly that notorious thief Procrastination, of whom every body has heard, and who is well known to have wronged my venerable father of much of his property. There are also three noted ruffians, Sleep, Sloth, and Pleasure, from whom I have suffered much; besides a certain busy-body called Dress, who, under pretence of making the most of me, and taking great care of me, steals away more of my gifts than any two of them.

"As for me, all must acknowledge that I have performed my part towards my friends and foes. I bave fulfilled my utmost promise, and been more bountiful than many of my predecessors. My twelve fair children have, each in their turn, aided my exer, tions; and their various tastes and dispositions have all conduced to the general good. Mild February, who sprinkled the naked boughs with delicate buds, and brought her wonted offering of early flowers, was not of more essential service than that rude blustering boy, March, who, though violent in his temper, was well-intentioned and useful.--April a gentle tender-hearted girl, wept for his loss, yet cheered me with many a smile. June came crowned with roses, and sparkling in sunbeams, and laid up a store of costly ornaments for her luxuriant successors: But I cannot stop to enumerate the good qualities and graces of all my children. You, my poor December, dark in your complexion, and cold in your temper, greatly resemble my first-born January, with this

difference, that he was most prone to anticipation, and you to reflection.

"If there should be any, who, upon hearing my dying lamentation, may feel regret that they have not treated me more kindly, I would beg leave to hint, that it is yet in their power to make some compensation for their past conduct, by rendering me, during my few remaining days, as much service as is in their power; let them testify the sincerity of their sorrow by an immediate alteration in their behaviour. It would give me particular pleasure to see my only surviving child treated with respect: let no one slight her offerings: she has a considerable part of my property still to dispose of, which, if well employed, will turn to good account. Not to mention the rest, there is one precious Sunday yet in her gift; it would cheer my last moments to know that this had been bettor prized than the past.

"It is very likely that, at least after my decease, many may reflect upon themselves for their misconduct towards me to such I would leave it as my dying injunction, not to

waste time in unavailing regret; all their wishes and repentance will not recal me to life. I shall never, never return! I would rather earnestly recommend to their regard my youthful successor, whose appearance is shortly expected. I cannot hope to survive long enough to introduce him; but I would fain hope that he will meet with a favourable reception; and that, in addition to the flattering honours which greeted my birth, and the fair promises which deceived my hopes, more diligent exertion and more persevering efforts may be expected. Let it be remembered, that one honest endeavour is worth ten fair promises."

Having thus spoken, the Old Year fell back on his couch, nearly exhausted, and trembling so violently as to shake the last shower of yellow leaves from his canopy. Let us all hasten to testify our gratitude for his services, and repentance for the abuse of them, by improving the remaining days of his existence, and by remembering the so lemn promises we made him in his youth.

How swiftly pass our years!
How soon their night comes on!
A train of hopes and fears,
And human life is gone!

See the fair SUMMER NOW is past;
The foliage late that clad the trees,
Stript by the equinoxial blast,

Falls, like the dewdrops on the breeze!

Cold WINTER bastens on!

Fair Nature feels his grasp;
Weeps o'er all her beauties gone,
And sighs their glory past!

So, LIFE, thy Summer soon will end,
Thine Autumn too will quick decay,
And Winter come, when thou shalt bend
Within the tomb to mould away.

But Summer will return,

In all her beauties dressed!
Nature shall rejoice again,

And be by man caressed!

But, oh! Life's summer passed away,
Can never, never hope return!

Cold winter comes, with cheerless ray,

To beam upon its dreary urn!

Then may we daily seek
A mansion in the skies,
Where Summers never cease,
And glory never dies!

There an eternal SPRING shall bloom,
With joys as vast as angels' pow'rs!
And thrice ten thousand harps in tune

Shall praise the love that made it ours.

PHENOMENON ON THE DEVONSHIRE COAST.

A CIRCUMSTANCE took place phical readers, and I therefore com

on a part of the maritime coast of this county, on Wednesday or Thursday, the 13th or 15th July (for my informant, though an intelligent seaman, could not recollect the exact day), which you will, no doubt, think deserving the attention of your philoso

municate to you the details I received of this phenomenon from the respectable person above mentioned, who seems to have observed it with peculiar accuracy.

The weather had been fine for some days preceding this event, the winds

being light and variable, but principally blowing from the South-east and South-west quarters, as is usual on the western coast in all this season of the year. The atmosphere seemed to be charged with electric matter, but no evolution of it had taken place in the neighbourhood whence my report is made; though from the South-west and at a considerable distance, a continual peal of thunder was heard, which lasted for many hours. From nine to eleven o'clock A. M. being a few hours before low water of neap-tide, a reflux of the tide took place with such great rapidity, that large boats of nine and ten tons burden, which were, to use the seaman's phrase, "high and dry" upon the beach of the river Dart, at about four miles from its embouchure, and at fourteen or fifteen paces from the verge of the river, were set afloat in the space of a few seconds. This reflux of the tide came up the river in the form of a huge wave, called by the fisherman a boar (or bore), which moved with so much velocity than some small boats exposed to its action were in imminent danger of being upset. A succession of this flux took place after the space of some minutes, and it continued to recur, though in a slight degree, at intervals of ten minutes, or a quarter of an hour, till low water, and for an hour or two after the flood-tide.

The occurrence above related will awaken in the minds of some of your older Correspondents (who may recollect the disastrous convulsions of the earth and sea, which devastated Lisbon in 1756, and more lately the earthquakes by which Sienna and its neighbourhood in Italy, Messina in Sicily, and all the contiguous coasts of Calabria were visited,) the apprehension of similar diasters in some parts of Europe; for I believe there are no instances upon record of the electrical influences having been extended to greater distances than the confines of that quarter of the world. An octogenarian with whom I have conversed, and who has served the office of the clerk of the parish whence this report comes upwards of 53 years, perfectly remembers that appearances of

the same nature as that above described took place, to the great dismay and terror of the village, immediately previous to the destruction of Lisbon. An interest was excited in the event which fastens on the memory whatever seemed to have any connexion with it; though in that day it was little suspected that any physical cause acting upon a place so remote as Lisbon, was likely to evince its influence, and that in a manner so simultaneous as to put all doubt out of the question, upon places so far removed out of its hemisphere.

A circumstance of a similar kind is related, I think, by Swinburne, either in the History of his Travels in Naples, &c. or in some subsequent production : he states, that the late Mr. Brydone (author of that beautiful work, entitled a Tour through Sicily and Malta") was on a visit to him at his house in Northumberland or Durham, and remarked to him on a certain day" that such were the extraordinary variations of his barometer, as to convince him that some considerable derangement of the order of nature was taking place at the time in some part of Europe." It afterwards proved to be the day when that dreadful earthquake took place in Sicily and Calabria, of which Sir William Hamilton has given so accurate and interesting account, and to which the destruction of a great part of the fine city of Messina and of Taormina, together with that of Reggio, Scilla, and other small towns in Ultra-Calabria, was owing.

The incident of the "huge wave," an expression, I believe, borrowed from Sir William Hamilton, as applying to the boar (bore), which my Devonshire fisherman has described to me, is remarked in Sir William's account of this disaster, as taking place on the coast of Calabria. Not many years after its occurrence, travelling into these countries, I passed some time at Reggio and Scilla, which then bore the marks of the ruin they had been involved in. At the latter place I met with a respectable and sensible apothecary, who was one of the comparatively few of its inhabitants that had escaped the destruction which this

"wave" brought upon the great majority. He stated to me, as indeed Sir William Hamilton relates, that, in order to avoid the imminent danger at tending the fall of houses in the town, by which several persons had been killed, the greater part of the inhabitants ran to the large beach extending along the shore from the point of Scilla, towards Reggio, where they erected tents, and remained part of the day and night in perfect security. It was the good fortune of this gentleman to be too infirm to accompany his son and his family to this place of shelter, and he remained in his garden, which was a little out of, and above the town.

At what period of the day or night I do not now recollect (and not having Sir William's book with me cannot ascertain with precision, nor indeed is it of importance,) the exact hour; but on the instant a tremendous wave was seen approaching the beach, w which, exaggerated perhaps by the terror of the beholders, seemed to be of from forty to fifty feet in height, and before they had power to take measures for escaping, swallowed up, "at one fell swoop,' as Shakspeare expresses it, the whole of this devoted party, consisting in all of from twelve to fifteen hundred persons.

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The Scrapiad.

A MAN of sensibility is always either in the attic of ecstacies, or the cellar of sorrow; either jumping with joy, or groaning with grief. But pleasure and pain are like a cucumber, the extremes are good for nothing. I once heard a late minister compared to the same vegetable, "For," said the punster, "his ends are bad."

That the style of such writings as are intended to attract the public eye be more elevated than that of private letters, is as requisite as it is for the pulpit of a preacher to be somewhat above the level of his auditors.

By too constant association, the sincerest friendship may be estranged, or rather, obliterated; as the richest coins are defaced by the friction of each other.

Different periods of time, when their order has faded from the memory, seem all consolidated into one; as the distant horizon appears to mingle with the sky.

An open countenance is like the face of a dial,-showing clearly what

passes within.

If perfection were ever once beheld, we should be so fully convinced of

the impossibility of equalling it, as to give up all attempts at imitation.

It is beauty whose frown is the most awful: no tempest equals that of a summer sky.

The best way to silence a talkative person is never to interrupt him. Do not snuff the candle, and it will go out of itself.

Anger is most fearful when unaccompanied by tears: it is lightning without rain.

When first we enter a crowd, there is little to be done but to push on through those before us, while our limbs are fresh and our spirits high; but we soon feel that multitudes are gathering behind us, and that the most we can hope, with probability of success, is to maintain our ground in advance of the new comers. And thus it is in a literary life. We set out, with a view of overtaking our forerunners in the chace; but event

ually find it sufficiently toilsome to preserve our advantage over those youthful competitors who are momently threatening to outstrip us.

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