the beautiful and poetical,-the present in pose commend me to a forest of pines, the practical and useful. That reared Thebes whose long, thread-like leaves form admiand the Pyramids, the Parthenon and Colise-rable harp-strings while on their parent tree, um, and carried to perfection, painting and and a no less admirable carpet when deposisculpture, poetry and eloquence; this has ted on the earth below, in which latter cainvented the press and the steam engine. pacity they have just been freshly spread for That invited the gods to earth, and gave winter. On this tempting bed let us lie them seats upon its mountains and in its down and with closed eyes listen to Fancy's groves on its rivers and its seas,-this interpretation of the multitudinous sounds boldly invades heaven itself to draw thence above, the rush of wings,-the murmur of ministers to the wants of man. The theft spirit voices,-high swelling anthems of of Prometheus was punished with the vul- praise to heaven above,-low, melancholy ture and the rock,-that of Franklin is re- moanings over earth beneath,-now ten thouwarded with immortal honor. When Phe-sand harps ringing jubilant, and ten thouton would drive the chariot of the sun he sand voices uniting in our ecstatic song of was hurled headlong from the heavens ;- triumph,-now all sinking, dying to the one Morse drives the lightning at his will, and is low, sweet tone of a once familiar voice encrowned with glory. treating us to join the angel throng with To return to November. The poet has feelings hushed, subdued,-the bodily sunk, sung of "chill November's surly blast" and the spiritual predominant,-methinks I feel every one echoes the strain. But I know at the moulting process begin,-the mortal coil least one friend November has. Why what is shuffling off, and bright butterfly wings same surly blast was a potent ally of mine, expanding, which are to waft me to those in the days of my boyhood, and who does happy realms above. But ah! that twinge not remember with delight whatever contri- in the shoulder, the result of lying on this buted to his boyish pleasures? Methinks I cold ground, feelingly reminds me that the see him now, with bag on shoulder, thread-spirit is yet a prisoner in its earthly tabering the mazes of one of those magnificent nacle,-the Koh-i-noor destined to shine in forests of the West, where part of my boy-palaces, lies yet darkling in the cave,-the hood was spent. And now the object of gay butterfly of the air is still a worm and my search, the shell-bark,-is reached, crawls. none of your saplings that a boy may climb I would not decry the universal favourite, like a squirrel, nor a tree with such low October. The feelings inspired by the glodrooping boughs as Absalom dangled from of ries of October are, however, of a voluptuyore, but a mighty column towering like ous cast. Its gorgeous foliage, its morning those of Carnac, and surmounted with branch- and evening skies flushed with every delies more heaven-pointing than the pyra-cate and lovely tint,-the serenity of its atmids. On those lofty limbs hang the temp-mosphere, all fill the soul with a sense of ting nuts, but I might as well "seek out beauty, a feeling of luxurious repose. We some bright particular star and think to win would be content to remain here forever in it, they are so above me." I hear however the enjoyment of such an existence. But that same surly blast approaching through November excites feelings of a higher and the forest aisles," discoursing most grand more solemn strain. Those leafy honours and solemn music on its "thousand wind- which have been the delight of Nature from harps," it plays in that lofty tree top be- April's green buds, to June's brilliant matufore me, and now "the sound of dropping rity, and October's dying splendor, have now nuts is heard," a tune more delightful to been gathered to the quiet of their sylvan my ears than all the ærial symphonies above. tombs-reminding us that we too must soon But the pleasure of nut gathering has de- mingle with the dust. It teaches that love, parted with the other substantial delights of and the pursuit of pleasure,-ambition and boyhood, and now in wandering through the the toiling after honor and riches, are but the forests of a November day I find one of my perishing flowers and foliage of existence. chief pleasures in its music. For this pur- They form the delight of youth, the excite

ment of middle age,-but when the November of life arrives they perish, and the fruit which springs from the culture of the soul

alone is valuable.

Go thou to the house of prayer,
I to the woodlands will repair.

and as for Collins, Gray and Goldsmith they are niched too high in the temple of the bards for wreaths or shafts to that the volumes seem to us greatly enhanced in interest

reach their statuesque and noble forms. But we may say

and value by the well-considered and pleasantly-written biographies from the pen of Mr. Epes Sargent, who, a poet himself of no mean rank, is quite capable of justly esti mating the merits of poets, and who has compiled the incidents of the lives of the four, whose writings and portraits and especially in the forest of November, are here given, into condensed but most agreeable sketches. shall have my better feelings more deeply We commend this new enterprise most cordially to pub stirred than by the most eloquent divine of them all.

Dinwiddie, Dec. 1854.

JULIET.

BY E. JESSUP EAMES.

Fair Psyche of the Drams, loveliest child,

Fond hearted Daughter of the sunny south, Whose summer passion, ardent, warm and wild, Yet purely beautiful and undefiled,

Is still the wondrous theme of every month! O gentle story of Italia's clime,

That like a dream of Poetry enchanted

The heart of youth!--and as the wondrous rhyme,
Of Fairy land, charmed in the olden time-
How are we by your being's beauty haunted!
Rich, rare, and radiant as a Summer Rose

When through the colors of the prism slanted,
And thus reflecting every hue that glows!--

In thy clear eyes, has mirror'd every feeling
That first found entrance in young Romeo's heart
The fond expression of his love revealing.

O Love! how strangely beautiful thou art-
When bride-like wearing the transcendant wreath
Of Youth and Hope perfumed by Passion's breath!

These volumes are two of a new Edition of the British Poets recently undertaken by the celebrated Boston house whose name is given on the title page. The typography is beautiful, the paper white and firm, the binding of stout muslin and the price so moderate, (one dollar the volume,) as to place the Edition within the reach of all lovers of English poetry. We need say nothing, of course, of the writers whose tuneful verses these two volumes comprise. Everybody that reads at all in this day has been affected by the pathos or the merriment of Hood,

THE AMERICAN ALMANAC and Repository of Useful
Knowledge, for the year 1855. Boston: Phillips, Samp-
son and Company. [From James Woodhouse, 139
Main Street.

It has now been twenty six years since this work was first established and, although it has sometimes been disfigured by misstatements of facts and arithmetical errors, its value has become so well known that no commercial or literary man will be without it. The very great amount of useful information it contains bearing upon the industrial and intellectual progress of the United States renders it of constant service as a book of reference. We are pleased to see its neatness of appearance preserved by the new hands into which it has fallen.

THE HISTORY AND POETRY OF FINGER RINGS. By
Charles Edwards, Counsellor at Law, New York:
Redfield, 110 and 112 Nassau Street. New York. 1855.
[From W. A. Butters, 157 Main Street.

A curious and interesting compilation evincing a vast amount of reading, in which will be found all that relates to the particular ornament which is the subject of the volume from the days of the heavy rings which are satirized by Juvenal and were gathered by the bushel at Canna, to the present time. The lover will see by referring to its pages what significance there is in the gage d'amour and the Sponsalium annulus or ring of affiance, and to all it will prove a pleasant volume for after dinner perusal or for a wet day in the country.

THE ROSE AND THE RING; or, the History of Prince
Giglio and Prince Bulbo, &c., &c. By Mr. M. A.
Titmarsh. New York: Harper & Brothers, Publish-
ers, Franklin Square. 1855. [From A. Morris, 97 Main
Street.

A charming little piece of tom-foolery by Thackeray, plentifully illustrated with the most grotesque designs from the facile crayon of that eminent master, the whole having been produced for the Christmas diversion of some English children the author met in Italy. No doubt these little folks were hugely delighted with the Fairy Blackstick and her marvellous doings, and with the beautiful Betsinda, while Kutasoff Hedzoff and Hoggiuarmo enabled them to "sup full of horrors." The older reader will detect under the superficial nonsense of the book, a quiet but sharp satire upon royalty and every where the bright wit of Mr. Titmarsh flashes through, like a blade beneath a worn and rusted scabbard. Thackeray is certainly a most industrious writer, for since his return to England, besides the monthly numbers of the Newcomes

Seven Volumes. Boston. Little, Brown & Co. [From
A. Morris, 97 Main Street. 1854.

and the correspondence of the Bashi-Bazouk in Punch, | THE POETICAL WORKS OF WILLIAM WORDsworth. he has contrived to throw off this story for children and to write a new series of Lectures which we hope to have the pleasure of hearing in the United States during the current year.

“A SOUTHERN HOME" is the title of a little volume recently issued by A. Morris of Richmond. It is designed especially for children but it may profitably be read by "grown-up people" as well. The tone is singularly pure and the style distinguished by simplicity in narration and animation in dialogue. The authoress of this agreeable juvenile, (for we understand it is the production of a lady,) has rendered an excellent service to Southern readers in weaving into fiction some of the more pleasing features of our local society, and we trust the book will be extensively circulated from the Potomac to the Gulf.

Of the numberless editions we have seen of the poems of the philosophical bard of Rydal Mount, this is by far the most to our taste. It is beautifully printed on clean white paper, and the size of the volumes is convenient for reading by the fireside, where one best enjoys the beau ties of such a writer. Volume 6 of the present edition contains the Prelude which has never before, so far us we know, been embraced in a complete series of Wordsworth's Writings.

SKETCHES OF SOME OF THE FIRST SETTLERS OF UPPER
GEORGIA, OF THE CHEROKEES AND THE AUTHOR. New
York: D. Appleton & Company. 1855. [From A.
Morris, 97 Main Street.

Mr. Morris has also just published a work of great vigor
and thought by George Fitzhugh Esquire entitled "Soci-
A very curious volume written by an excellent and
ology for the South." The aim of the writer has been to kind-hearted old gentleman, formerly member of Congress
show the failure of free society-not to defend slavery, from Georgia, and at one time Governor of that State,
but to attack other systems of labour, and his views are the Hon. George R. Gilmer. The style of it is remarka-
of far too much importance and interest to our own sec-bly unambitious, and its arrangement somewhat imme-
tion of the Union to be summarily noticed. We shall thodical, yet it contains a vast deal of information of a
therefore take occasion to examine the volume at length genealogical sort and will prove highly interesting to the
in the next number of the Messenger.
numerous offspring of the original settlers of Georgia.

HARD TIMES. A Novel. By Charles Dickens. New York. Harper & Brothers. 1854. [From A. Morris97 Main Street.

This work is rather hard reading and on that account may be well suited to Hard Times. But for the name

The KALEIDOSCOPE is the title of a weekly paper devoted to Literature, Temperance and Education, which has just appeared in Petersburg under the editorial auspices of Mrs. Rebecca B. Hicks, well known in literary of Diekens as the author, we think it would scarcely have circles as the author of numerous novellettes, and as a been thought worthy of reprint in an American Edition, contributor to Putnam, Graham and other popular magaAs coming from the pen of the author of Nicholas Nick-zines. We are glad to see this evidence of a literary spirit leby it is curious as an illustration of the decline and fall of genius, but we are not willing to believe that he cannot and will not produce something better to prove himself yet a writer of power in the delineation of character and the developement of human passion.

We are indebted to Mr. J. W. Randolph for several of the newest publications of that most industrious of bookmen, Bohn of London. The second volume of the Philsophical Works of Locke embraces the famous Treatise on the Human Understanding which has rendered the author's name classic in all lands. An additional volume of the Classical Library presents us with an excellent Translation of the Cyropædia and Hellenics of Xenophon by two English Collegians. It will gratify the lovers of sound learning to know that Mr. Bohn has also commenced a complete Edition of the writings of Burke of which the first volume is now before us, together with the life of this great Statesman by Prior uniformly bound in muslin. We have had repeated occasions to commend to our readers the Libraries of Bohn for their cheapness and value in a literary point of view. We cannot call to mind a single one of these publications that does not well deserve a place upon private bookshelves as well as in the collections of societies and literary institutions. Mr. Randolph is in regular receipt of all of them from Messrs. Bangs, Brothers & Co., the New York agents of the euterprising publishers.

among the enlightened citizens of the Cockade, and we cordially wish Mrs. Hicks the most abundant success in her new enterprise, feeling assured, as we do, that she will at least deserve, if she be not able to command it.

The editorials of the two numbers before us are full of a hopeful enthusiasm, and indicate a determination on the part of the Editor, to work to some purpose in the fields of Southern letters. There is a variety, too, in their contents, which fully justifies the title of the paper, and at each new turn (of a leaf) we see novel and brilliant combinations of genius and fancy.

From A. Morris we have received the poems of COLERIDGE, in three volumes, and of KEATS and WATTS, cach in one volume-all in the beautiful Boston edition of Little, Brown & Co., which has become so popular. The collected poems of Dr. Watts are especially acceptable, inasmuch as it has not an easy matter heretofore to procure them, and as some of his beautiful hymns are enshrined in the memory of every man and woman who has had a Christian mother. The volume contains in addition to the Hora Lyricæ, a spirited portrait of the author, and a memoir from the pen of Dr. Southey, which embodies the incidents of his life in a concise and readable form. Of Keats and Coleridge we can never have too many editions, and we are glad to see these authors placed within the reach of all lovers of the "vision and the faculty divine."

PUBLISHED MONTHLY AT THREE DOLLARS PER ANNUM-JNO. R. THOMPSON, EDItor.

VOL. XXI.

RICHMOND, MARCH, 1855.

FAILURE OF FREE SOCIETIES."

NO. 3.

is at length planted on the firm basis of philosophical reasoning, historical testimony, and social experience. The discussion of the question is thus removed from the domain of sectional controversy and political warfare, and transferred to the more temperate and authoritative tribunal of sober and

Mr. Fitzhugh is a singularly bold and adventurous thinker. In the midst of the denunciations of slavery fulminated from nearly all parts of the civilized world he replies cautious reflection. We would not intimate to its clamorous and fanatical assailants by that no recourse has been had hitherto to alleging the utter failure of the antagonistic system which they have adopted, and rephilosophy, history and experience, but they garded as alone expedient, right and immac- have never before been as prominently, and ulate. In the midst of the constant repeti- we might add, as skilfully employed in tion of apologetic excuses offered by writers establishing the abstract justice and inhein the Southern States on behalf of the institu- rent propriety of Southern slavery. Even tion, he abandons the common line of defence, in the argument of Mr. Fitzhugh the manacts vigorously on the offensive, and, as he ner of their employment is not altogether himself says, carries the war into Africa. free from objection. There is a want of fulThis great change of strategy would aloneness, of precision, and of moderation, which render the treatise of "Sociology for the is constantly felt, and which continually ocSouth" which he has recently presented to casions imperfection, inadequacy or extravathe public sufficiently remarkable, even if gance in the results. Any candid mind, the subject were one of less interest, and his however, will cheerfully pardon these defects argument less able and striking than it is. in the first brief, hasty outline of a new theoThe book is in all respects both curious and ry, and will correct for itself the blemishes interesting: it overflows with thought, and which it discovers, and which do not seriis full of startling doctrines and novel tenets. ously impair the tenor of the argument, It attacks the generally received opinions on nearly all topics connected with political laxed, and often overlaid in the course of its science, and broaches almost as many here- present evolution. With the same spirit of sies as it exposes errors. Fortunately its genial appreciation, a mind, sincerely anxaberrations are principally confined to the ious to discover the truth, will make all promode of statement, and to subordinate de- per allowances for the exuberance of the tails, while the new truths which it advances, unnecessary speculation combined with the though too broadly and incautiously asserted, are in the main as correct as they are saga

cious.

It is very satisfactory to find that the justification of the South is no longer limited to excuses, expediencies, dialectics, rhetoric, verbal quibbles and vain recriminations, but

Sociology for the South: or the Failure of Free Society. By George Fitzhugh. Richmond, Va. A. Mor

ris Publisher. 1854. 1 vol. 12 mo.

Histoire de la Classe Ouvrière, depuis l'Esclave jusqu'an
Prolétaire de nos jours Par Robert (du Var) Ex re-
dacteur en chef de la Démocratie. Paris. chez Michel,
Editeur. 1850. 4 vols. 8vo.

VOL. XXI.-17.

which is sometimes strained, sometimes re

discussion of the main thesis, for the frequent disquisitions and want of perspicuous unity of procedure, which are as apt to confound the hasty reader as they are to betray the hasty writer. If the Sociology for the South' is studied in this truth-loving and truth-seeking spirit, it will be found full of valuable suggestions, and if it does not in all cases communicate the great truths by which it is inspired, it will lead readily to their discovery and recognition.

The position maintained, the doctrines expounded, and the conclusions established