you Germans call Wehmuth - do you not?" she asked; but before I could reply, she said, with a sudden way peculiar to her, "Do you like ballads?" "Certainly," I replied; "they are the domestic tone-poetry of a nation. Indeed, I like good music wherever I find it. The history of a people's life-experiences is written in its music." "It is so refreshing," she exclaimed, "to find a musician who is not bigoted in his art. Most of them affect an exclusiveness which is as narrow as the sectarianism of the churches. And yet it seems to me that the artist, above all others, should have the power to perceive Beauty where the duller sense finds only a fog of commonplaces." "Yes," I answered, "the true artist should be a true democrat. But it is getting late," I added, looking at my watch. I turned from the eager face, and the following moment found me on the pavement. Here, at last, is a true woman in the larger sense. We men tire of the eternal sweet woman who smiles forever at our elbow. We want in woman a touch of grandeur and fire to rouse, mingled with the tender that softens. The maiden of G-square has a rare scope of nature. With the brain to grasp great ideas, she unites the glow of genius and a fine delicacy of intuition. She possesses, too, that rarest of charms among the modern editions of young ladyhood-perfect health. Ye gods! what a privilege is the acquaintanceship of a woman who is never afflicted with indigestion! To come in contact with a clean soul acting through a clean body. Migraine, with its inevitable languors; the constant weariness which assumes constantly reclining attitudes; the capability of fainting at any required moment, are qualifications apparently quite unknown to this nineteenth-century Hebe. Why do the artistic heroes and heroines of to-day claim morbidity as the prerogative of genius? Why are the disciples of the arts, who have continual gastric complaint, considered more gifted and poetical than those who are so unfortunate as to have sound stomachs ? A vital question,

this. Dear Journal! I see that my favorite pupil is the almost constant topic of these pages. I return from her luxurious home to my naked room, and make a minute record of the hour spent in her presence, to gain a double experience of it. I admire her; yes, there is no denying it. She appeals to my tastes and gratifies my artistic instincts. She has, too, a fine breadth and independence, which stimulates like the keen breath of mountain-air. She has grown up like a wild plant, with no wise hand to prune and direct; but the plant has a rich juice in its veins, and bears no puny blossom. The man who takes this woman to his heart must be vastly strong, patient, and tender. She will inspire, enlarge, and refine him, and give him divine emotions. She will also sting, torment, and contradict him. He may be charmed with the friskiness of the wild merlin, but he will find her hard of management. The task would give full play to his powers. An attractive, challenging task! It makes the blood flow swifter to dwell on it. Heavens! am I mad? Come with me, my Journal, to the mir

ror.

What do you see there? Is that grave, colorless, commonplace face likely to charm an artistic maiden? Now turn from the contemplation of the person, to the surroundings of this lord of creation. And this is the home he would offer the Peri of his choice! Now, if I were fortunate and well favored- but I am a fool, even in thought to couple our destinies. It is well that an inexorable Fate divides us. She stands over my shoulder now as I write, a smile of ineffable scorn on her grim visage.

February 24th.-To-day I brought Miss Estelle some of Bach's music. She was quite unacquainted with it. I placed before her the "Alemande" of Suite No. 2 in C minor, worthy to be the ancestress of all pure sonatas. She caught its spirit with her usual insight, and accented the rhythm, which in Bach marks the ebb and flow of emo tion, with a marvellous nicety. Intui tion taught her what study reveals to

few. Then I gave her the second minuet of Opus No. 1-a musical dewdrop. Ah, thou great Sebastian! even we, who so love and reverence thee, can never scale the grandeur of thy heights or fathom the pathos of thy depths. I found, upon my return this evening, an invitation from Mrs. Irving to a musical soirée at her house next week. Do I owe the honor of this attention to the recent discovery made by this worldly lady, viz., that our family-name bore originally the prefix of a "Von?"

March 2d.-The soirée is over, and was considered a success, I believe. There were various musical performances, many of which were unmeaning, but all were followed by lively plaudits, and ecstatic murmurs of "How sweet!" "How delightful!" Vocalists and instrumentalists proceeded to their performance with an air that evinced they considered they were gracing music, and not vice versa-a troupe of modern Jack Horners, each with his especial plum, and each in his own especial style heralding forth his own dimensions. The hero of the evening was a young American who has lately discovered himself a genius. When called upon to perform, he took his seat at the piano with an air worthy of Gottschalk, and sent beaming smiles into his audience in the lingering process of divesting his hands of their kid coverings. Of course, he first attacked the instrument in a series of dashing original (?) chords-(why must we always have this preliminary splurge?)-and then proceeded to his piece. He played his own compositions in preference to those of his brother masters; and his choice seemed to gain him an almost reverent admiration. He has faculty, but lacks that surest sign of real worth, modesty. He will be popular, however, for he will descend to Humbug, and will live by, not for, Art. I watched him as the specimen of a type, and lost myself in thoughts of the departed great ones, who went about among men unknown, unsought, bearing in their souls the consciousness of a holy power, but humbly acknowledging themselves VOL. II.--5

only the imperfect instruments of the Divine purpose. Among the instrumental performances was Beethoven's duett in F for violin and piano. The performers executed it neatly, but its inner meaning was Chaldaic to them. My God! when will revelation come? When will men and women be pure and great enough to interpret the glorious gospel of this divine tone-prophet? His works are becoming fashionable now; but how seldom we hear a virtuoso who reproduces his music in its real simplicity and grandeur, without paralyzing its nerve, without extinguishing the celestial fire that burned in the Titan-master's soul. The prima donna of the evening was a young lady with a clear, powerful voice, who certainly deserved credit for the dexterity of her roulades and the purity of her trills. This tight-rope dancing of an agile larynx gains for the performer a decided popularity; but does the heart beat quicker at the perfect mechanism? A brilliant execution is certainly a most admirable thing, but one would be willing to forego it somewhat for a little more poetry and originality of conception. Most singers learn their song by rote, commit to memory the spots where they must scream, gasp, sigh, or smile, and the thick-skinned public accepts the sham sensibility for a reality. And yet, how wretched the semblance. We do not realize it till some genuine touch of Nature rouses the real heart of humanity. Thank God, the modern Prometheus, though somewhat tamed by civilization, is not yet in chains. Miss Estelle sang an Italian aria this evening; for she knew that a simple song of Franz or Schumann was too pure and significant for the comprehension of a stylish American audience. How charmingly she looked. She was dressed in a simple white muslin, her only ornament a damask rose gleaming in her hair; but the glow of its tint was not warmer than the light in her eye, or brighter than her smile. Yes, she is beautiful-with a beauty that torments while it fascinates; for you can neither seize nor explain it. My

arm.

eye never lost her, though I was crafty in the espionage. I noticed that another watched her as closely as I the young officer whose feet followed her motions as boldly as his eye. He certainly has many charms—a fine head and face, orientally dark and flashing, and a manly, graceful figure. But his most eloquent charm was a wounded Who would not willingly suffer the pang of bullet and surgical knife, to win glances so dewy with approval? Miss Estelle has no lukewarm patriotism. To her the United States soldier is the champion of a great idea, the hero of a noble crusade. But this young officer! Were those looks only for the military hero? Did no sweet personal emotion mingle with the undisguised interest? He seems to be intimate in the family, and has probably frequent access to her

society. A young woman might easily be magnetized by his Eastern eyes. They looked well this evening, as they stood together; his handsome head bent slightly as she looked up, sending the light of her smile into his face. As I watched them, I became convinced of a fact that I have mocked at and denied, viz., that I loved her utterly, and that to live for, or without her were the only prospects that lay in the perspective of my future-a lifelong happiness or a lifelong sorrow. But I will cast the madness from me, at whatever cost. In the meantime, I will procure a likeness of myself, also one of the handsome officer. They shall hang side by side, and I will make the contrast a constant study. A good sedative, this, for the imagination.

(To be continued.)

I.

II.

FAR away to the northwest, between the great lakes Huron and Michigan, lies the pleasant island called by the redmen Michilimacinac, or the Sleeping Turtle. In that region also are found headlands known as the Sleeping Bear and the Sleeping Rabbit-names which indicate that the district was formerly, as now, a land of Drowsy-head, and filled with somnolent influences. The more valuable is it as a refuge for the overtasked brains and bodies of St. Louis and Chicago citizens, who, being always wide awake at home, need the perfect repose furnished at Mackinaw, where, unvexed by daily mail or telegram, they can fill their lungs with oxygen and their stomachs with whitefish.

There are many points of resemblance between Mackinaw and that other island of beauty which lies in Narraganset Bay-Aquidneck of the Indians, the Island of Rhodes of the Pilgrims, or Newport Island of to-day. Both were important commercial centres a hundred years ago, before the modern upstarts, New York and Chicago, were famous. Newport had a great trade with the West Indies and Africa, resting on rum and slavery; Mackinaw supplied all the frontier posts with Indian goods, cheap guns, shoddy blankets, glass beads, and whiskey; and to each place its ill-gotten wealth proved a delusion. Both islands are historical, and were the scene of solemn treaties and bloody battles; and after all their former glories, they are now supported by summer visitors and the fisheries. Both islands are beautiful in land and water views, in climate, and in atmosphere-the western island excelling in landscape, and the eastern in water-prospect. The population of each has remained the same for the last half century, and the people have in both places a slow, indifferent, sleepy character, unlike that of other American towns. In the words of the wise Fluel

len, "You shall find that the situations, look you, is both alike. There is a river in Macedon, and there is also, moreover, a river at Monmouth, and there is salmons in both."

As we approach Mackinaw coming through the straits from Chicago, we see the resemblance which the island bears to a turtle sleeping on the calm water; but as the boat rounds to, and enters the little harbor round which the village is built, the likeness changes to that of an alligator's head, with the white cliffs representing the uncovered teeth of the monster.

As we step ashore, we are greeted with the pleasant smile of our host of the Mission House; and there, at the head of the pier, stands his omnibus, the same which we rode in twenty years ago, and apparently the same horses. Time deals gently with men and things in Mackinaw; and, thus reflecting, we arrive at the Mission House. The house has a pleasant seat, lying under the shelter of a limestone cliff covered with cedars, and looking out over a lawn upon the mile of water which separates this island from Bois Blanc and Round Island.

The house appears to be full, but we trust that Mr. Franks will be able to find us a room if we leave him to study the situation. There is no use in being in a hurry here: "Slow and easy" is the word. An interesting uncertainty pervades all arrangements. You order a carriage for 4 o'clock, it arrives at 6. You and your party wish to meet the sun upon the mountain-tops, and direct the stable-keeper to send the three saddle-horses known on the island, at 5 A. M. Two of them arrive just as the breakfast-bell is ringing; the third, having escaped to the woods, is no longer available. You engage a sailboat to be at the wharf at 9; at that hour you see its white sails three miles away. As to the meals, they come when

the cook pleases, and he generally takes a liberal margin of time. But time is of no consequence; our business here is to kill it, and we succeed; it dies, and makes no sign. It is this absence of law and order which makes the place so attractive to children; here they run wild, unvexed by rules of behavior or

manners.

We notice another peculiarity: nothing is in place; every thing is used for an unusual purpose. The stable-keeper has boats to let; the doctor deals in nets and fishing gear. We visit the fort, and find it deserted; entering by escalade through a rear sally-port, we find no garrison except a pig, who comes grunting a welcome which seems to say that it is long since he has seen the face of man. The only church on the island partakes of the same confusion, and is used for a wash-house. It is but fair to add, however, that the owner of the church offers it for its legitimate uses whenever a preacher shall be forthcoming; until that time, linen will be cleansed instead of souls.

He

The hotel has a long piazza in front, where most of the company is to be found. They are chiefly from the western cities, though an occasional New Yorker may be noticed by the shortness of his coat-tails or the slenderness of his legs. If a Philadelphian, we see that the hereditary neatness of costume and primness of accost yet lingers in the land of the Quaker. Your Bostonian, again, affects the English style. clothes himself in rough garments, cultivates the long side-whisker, is pedestrian and sporting in his tastes, and if he appears on horseback his nag must be a trotter. The Western men, mostly coming originally from the Eastern States, show a mixture of the habits of all, though the New York type prevails. But in the West, the cities are less important than elsewhere, and exercise less social influence. The great agricultural population of the West, which feeds the nation, which furnished the armies that saved its life, and which must soon politically control it, this population knows little and cares less for the vaga

ries of fashion. These people stay at home on their farms, and are seldom seen at watering-places. So that the people we meet at Mackinaw, or on Lake Superior, are not plants of Western growth, but merely Eastern merchants and lawyers transplanted. So we see that the ladies here wear the chignon as large, and the train as sweeping, as you find them at Newport or Saratoga; while the men look like Broadway somewhat modified by the freedom of Western life-with some of the starch washed out by Lake Michigan.

We are told by Schoolcraft, "that wherever Missilimacinac is mentioned in the missionary letters or in early history, it is the ancient fort on the apex of the Michigan peninsula that is alluded to." There were two places called Mackinaw-" Old Mackinaw," on the south side of the straits, seven miles from the island, and "New Mackinaw." The first was settled by Father Marquette in 1671, and was for many years the metropolis of the Ojibwa and Ottawa nations, and the theatre of some of the most important events in Indian history previous to the arrival of the white man. In 1675, Father Marquette died, on his way back from Kaskaskia to his mission at Old Mackinaw, and his body was brought here for burial by the friendly Indians, great numbers of whom followed in their canoes; and the Catholic historian says, "Marquette reposes here as the guardian angel of the Ottawa missions." The bones of the pious father, however, were not suffered to rest; for when the post of Mackinaw was removed, about 1780, from the peninsula to the island, his remains were transferred to the old Catholic burial-ground in the village upon the island. There they remained till a property-question arose to agitate the church; the graveyard was disturbed, and the bones of Marquette, with others, were transferred to the Indian village of La Crosse, near L'Arbre Croche, Michigan. For many years after the burial of the good father, in 1675, Old Mackinaw was the headquar