propriate sequel, cannot fail to fill the reader with astonishment at the vast resources and immense agricultural value of the interior and western portions of our country. The report alluded to, has been reprinted in England, and has contributed largely to increase the confidence of all who have read it, in the wealth and future progress of the United States. Five or six powerful western states are rapidly rising into eminence at the west; a territory more than six times as large as England, and embracing more than one hundred and eighty millions of acres of arable, fertile land.

The volume contains a beautiful plan and drawing of a 'prairie cottage,' with details which will render its construction perfectly easy. It contains two rooms fifteen feet square, with chambers and a piazza; and the estimated expense of the whole is but two hundred dollars! It is a benevolent exercise of a cultivated mind, to furnish the details of such economical and pleasant structures, surpassing in convenience, and even in cheapness, the log cabins to which emigrants so often resort. In perusing this pleasant book, nothing has struck us with more surprise, than the extent to which machinery has been applied to the purposes of agriculture. Our author has gathered the fullest information on this subject, and has given descriptions of eighteen different labor-saving inventions, some of which perform the labor of several men. He has chapters, also, on the cultivation of the sugar beet, broomcorn, tobacco, the sun-flower, and flax. A new process for the manufacture of the latter product, of the highest importance to the northern and western states, is here described. It bids fair, we should judge, to render the manufacture of flax so rapid and cheap, as to supplant, in some measure, the use of cotton. For the particulars, we must refer the reader to the volume itself. The privations incident to a western residence, are in a great measure an offset to the prospect of rapid wealth; but they are yearly becoming less and less; and so far as society is concerned, the most fastidious emigrant will hardly complain, if the west numbers among its population many gentlemen possessing the intelligence, taste, and scholarship, of the accom plished author of this work.

THE GIFT: A CHRISTMAS AND NEW YEAR'S PRESENT, for 1839. Edited by Miss LESLIE. pp. 324. Philadelphia: E. L. CAREY AND A, HART. New-York: WILEY AND PUTNAM.

THIS is certainly a very excellent annual, whether we regard its tasteful and delicate arabesque binding, the general beauty of its engravings, or the entertainment to be derived from its clear letter-press pages. The frontispiece and title-page vignette, engraved by CHENEY, from paintings by CHALON and SULLY, are gems, especially the latter. 'Rustic Civility,' is another very felicitous picture, painted by COLLINS, and engraved by PEASE; and so too is 'The Goldfinch,' from the pencil of PARRIS, and the graver of FORREST. There are also several other prints of merit. The contents are from the pens of some of our best writers. JOHN INMAN leads off the dance, with a very spirited story, entitled 'The Prisoner's Last Dream;' MORGAN NEVILLE, a western littérateur of eminence, has an extended and very clever sketch, called 'Poll Preble, or the Law of the Deer-Hunt;' and the accomplished author of 'Clinton Bradshaw' another, entitled 'A chapter from the Adventures of a Lame Gentleman.' Miss EMMA C. EMBURY, ROBERT WALSH, Jr., Miss H, B. STOWE, and others whom we have not space to mention, add to the prose attractions of the volume. The poetry is abundant, and much of it good; among the best, that by PARK BENJAMIN, Mrs. SIGOURNEY, Mrs. GILMAN, Miss H. F. GOULD, and Mrs. HALE. Altogether, the volume is such a 'Gift' as any friend may make to a sister or a lover, with the assurance, that while its adornments may delight, its intellectual qualities will interest and improve, the reader.

EDITORS' TABLE.

A GOSSIP WITH SOME OF OUR CORRESPONDENTS. - We have opened our 'drawer' once more, for a short parley with some of the literary prisoners, that have been awaiting their trials for several weeks, and even months, charged with apparent offences against taste or propriety. As usual, many have suffered confinement, by reason of a hasty suspicion originally attached to them, which finally proves to have been groundless. A few of these are honorably discharged below; and to the friends of others yet in duresse, we can only say, that they too shall have all justice,' when time and space shall serve. In short, to drop an unmanageable metaphor, and proceed to business, we resign a copious 'note-book,' to make room in the present number for more acceptable matter, from various correspondents; and in a subsequent issue, we shall consider many remaining favors, of a kindred character. The subjoined deserves the place of honor, and it shall have precedence. Make way, therefore, ye intellectual dapperlings, and literary exquisites, who beat the coverts of the imagination for hard-wrought similes, make way for a farmer's boy, from a sequestered vale of the Connecticut, who draws his figures from ever-glorious nature! What an unassured and faltering hand he throws across the lyre, in the annexed stanzas, which were carded and spun at the plough-tail, in the open field, and under the clear sky! The letter which accompanied the lines, is characteristic, and we cannot resist the inclination to quote it here. 'I can't think of any lie,' says the writer, 'to serve as an apology for this intrusion:

'I am nae poet, in a sense,

But just a rhymer, like, by chance,

An' hae to learning nae pretence,
Yet, what the matter?

Whene'er my muse does on me glance,
I jingle at her,'

'My calling is the plough; my delight the wondrous works of Nature; and when abroad, pursuing my labors in the open air, the melody of birds, and the music of winds and waters, fill me with what shall I call it? — inspiration? It is something more difficult for me to describe, than it would be to write off the notes played by an Æolian harp. At such times, conning over the sweet strains of some favorite bard, or raving to the winds in my own imperfect measure, gives my spirit ease, and fills my breast with that 'peace which passeth all understanding.' Any thing which savors of Indian memory an arrow-head, a mouldering bone, a broken pipe, or other like relics, which are often disinterred by our farmers is sure to affect my poor muse. From a child, I have been an ardent admirer of the Indian character; have indulged, alternately, in tears of sympathy, while poring over the red man's wrongs, and the burnings of indignation, at the iniquities practised upon him by villanous white men, libelling the name of Christian. This attachment led me, in the autumn of 18, to the wilds of Wisconsin and Iowa, where I sojourned for a considerable period, revelling in the romance of burning prairies and primeval forests, and entering with spirit into all the soul-stiring scenes of a savage and backwoods life. * * I subjoin an offspring of my rustic Muse, which is about a day and a half old. Should the old gentleman of the long pipe and antique chair think it promising enough to become its sponsor in baptism, and give it a

name, it would be useless for me to add, that its poor mother would be justly proud of such a god-father. On the contrary, should it be frowned at for venturing so far from home, among strangers, the returning of this sheet will be a sufficient hint for the dame to keep her 'bairns' at home for the future, to make the most of the solitudes of their nativity. The present state of my purse debars me from many a literary feast, such as the KNICKERBOCKER Would afford me; and your humble servant is not hypocrite enough to become a 'patron,' only in the sound of the word itself.'

Great Spirit of Good, whose abode is the heaven,
Whose wampum of peace is the bow in the sky,
Wilt thou give to the wants of the clamorous raven,
Yet turn a deaf ear to my piteous cry?
O'er the ruins of home, o'er my heart's desolation,
No more shalt thou hear my unblest lamentation;
For death's dark encounter I make preparation,
He hears the last groan of the wild Cherokee!

Those who know any thing of Indian metaphor, will be struck with the exquisite simile in the last stanza of the foregoing poem, not less than with the happy allusions to nature which pervade the whole. Verily, MAGA shall go 'sans charge' to the writer, for many a long year; and although we are compelled, from the use we have made of his letter, to suppress his name, it will yet be made widely known to the American public, through these pages, or we are no literary seer. We grasp our distant poet's hand, and assure him of an ever-cordial welcome to the offspring of his heart and fancy.

HERE is a zoological article. Burns had his louse and his mouse, Coleridge his jackass, and Southey paid his addresses to John Poulter's old mare. Why then should our

correspondent's subject be considered an infelicitous theme? By 'r Lady, no! It is a fruitful topic, and treated in a Lamb-like vein. The writer derived his hint from Mr. BUCKINGHAM, who speaks in the highest terms of the oriental jackass. He describes him as a noble animal, full of energy and spirit, beauty and majesty, as depicted by Job, of Uz. 'When a person meets a friend,' says the distinguished traveller, with an unusal degree of cheerfulness in his countenance, he usually addresses him: 'How now? What goods news have you heard this morning? You look as brisk as an ass!'' We plunge into our correspondent's Ms., in medias res, asking absolution for the sin of occasional episodical curtailment. What is written,' however, 'remains,' for 't is too clever to be lost, and may speak, in effective fragments hereafter, with voice potential, from our drawer.

'PRITHEE, shepherd, who keeps all these jackasses? Heaven be their comforter! What! Are they never curried? Are they never taken in, in the winter? Bray on; the world is deeply your debtor. Louder still- that's nothing. In good sooth, you are ill used. Were l a jackass, I solemnly declare, I would bray in G-SOL-RE-UT, from morning, even unto night. TRISTAM SHANDY.

READER, I would commune with you, here in my own little study. "Tis a chill, dark November evening; the wind howls and whistles round the corner, and the sharp rain pelts against the window; but sit you down. We will first close the shutters, and stir up our cheerful fire; so,

The storm without may roar and rustle,

We will not mind the storm a whistle.'

Now, from my comfortable elbow chair, ex-cathedra, I will discourse to you, in my loose, rambling way-OF ASSES. Ah! my friends, consider - are we not all asses, to a degree? And as soon as we are able to bear, are harnessed with our panniers, and have all our heavy burthens to carry, our weary, toilsome journeys to take; what strength there is in us, tasked to the uttermost; and must patiently bow our heads to the vile blows and buffets of our cruel task-master, the world; receiving no gratitude for our labors only a niggardly provender of thistles! - nay, too often turned out to die upon the first moor, when no longer fit for service. With the ass we are alike, even though unlike. Let us find content and resignation in the example of our four-footed brother. Let us widen our sympathies, too much contracted by our own selfish pursuits, interests, and gratifications, that they may embrace him, with all the other inferior creatures, (for such we deem them) of the earth, in their circle. Consider how mysteriously we are linked with the humblest living creature, and are bound up with all nature in one wonderful, inseparable whole. Is not the ass, too, animate, living, and life-giving-God-created? The subtle Frenchman, who defined speech to be the cloak of thought,' could not have expressed himself more enigmatically, than we, in thus addressing some poor ass: Alas, my brother! thou art beaten with stripes, even as I am. Thy life, like mine, is one bitter struggle with necessity. I pity thee, even as I am to be pitied. I weep for thee, as I weep for myself. I would lighten thy heavy burden; I would soften thy rugged condition, I would stretch forth my hand and help thee, did not my own hard task require both my hands to help myself. As it is, I can only commiserate thee and my sympathy is thine.' I venture to predict, that not one in a thousand will get at my meaning.

*

When Yorick Sterne was communing, in his amiable way, with the honest jackass, which had turned into the court-yard, to collect eleemosynary turnip-tops and cabbage leaves, the ill-starred animal was the innocent cause of the strangest disaster to his friend's unmentionables: but it provoked not one unkind word from the benevolent sufferer only the equivocal interjection, 'Out upon it!' The 'dead ass' of the 'Sentimental Journey,' and the lamentation of honest Sancho over his faithful four-footed friend and companion, were never excelled for heart-touching pathos; delightfully tinged with that quaint, playful humor, which ever accompanies true sensibility. Read them, if you have not, and then say if you longer remain cold and impassive to my theme.

Hardly-entreated brother! Despite the 'odd quirks and remnants of wit' that may be broken on me, I will speak one kindly word for thee, though none else will. Paper-pellets of the brain' shall not awe me from my humor. Calm, humble, forbearing, cheerful most emphatic of teachers! Creature of many sorrows! Victim of thy many virtues! for thee, this troublous life is but a prolonged purgatory. Thy tender years-alas! to thee no childhood - only a state of painful transition to the time when thou art able to bear the burthen. The spring-time of existence thou scarcely knowest, for thy rough, rugged journey is ever before thee. No gamesome infancy, na hopeful, joyous youth; but life is a troubled, fast-hurrying stream, which

beareth thee on, weary laden, to its ocean of storms and tempests. A cloud seems to overshadow thee from thy very birth. Thy pensive head declines sadly to the earth, as if prophetic of thy life of sorrow. Who could look, unmoved, upon thy little ungainly form, devoid of that soft, infantile grace, peculiar to childhood? Thy rugged coat, thy little pendulous tail, stumpy and barren; thy long, misshapen head, surmounted with its curious steeples; thy little round eyes, sad, perhaps dull, yet cast in innocent, halftrustful, half-timorous glances, upon the stranger biped; sparkling with a brief ray of intelligence, when wooed to eat of a crust from his hand? And when thou hast grown to more mature donkeyhood, that depreciating look of patient submission, written so touchingly in thy countenance, seeming to say, 'Don't thrash me! but if you will, you may! Alas, poor beast! Thy patience is called dullness; thy meekness, stupidity; thy more than Roman firmness, obstinacy. 'Oh monstrous world!'

Thus are we all, my friends, libelled and traduced. We are befooled by custom, and be-mystified by names. See! one is not a reed to be shaken by every wind; his constancy is deemed stubbornness! Another is not a powder wain, to take fire and explode at every spark; his calmness is misnamed stolidity! Another is patient under wrongs, and meek and forbearing amidst insult; he is pusillanimous! Another may be of an enduring honesty; then he is simply fool!

In such manner has our poor four-footed brother been misinterpreted by a slanderous world. Custom has taught us to scorn those qualities in him, which, if rightly understood, we should deem virtues, until his very name has become a term of reproach. Apply it to the petulant little being of humanity, and lo! he strait takes fire; repels with fiercest invective the injurious appellation; and does hot battle with his accuser, for the name; when, if he was not the very dotard of custom, the name of 'ass' would be to him a title of honor. Did not a partial ray of the truth flash upon that man, who, moralizing over the skeleton of a jackass, exclaimed, with impressive solemnity, We are all fearfully and wonderfully made!'

Exemplary animal! what sins can be laid at thy door? Nay, let us examine this thing; what sins before man or God? Pride? Alas! thou art all humility. Covetousness? A thistle will content thee. Gluttony? Though thou has spent no prodigal's portion, yet the very husks were dainty to thy frugal tastes. Anger? Thy serene composure amidst insults and injuries, is almost sublime. Ingratitude? The 'marble-hearted fiend' has no place in thy breast. Thou art willing to lay down thy life in the service of thy master. Though he often overloads thee, conducts thee along with blows, insults thee with unnecessary stripes, and, at best, rewards thy faithful labors with a meagre subsistence of weeds, that the more fastidious horse would scorn, thy affection for him is remarkable; coming at his call; marking him out amidst a crowd; scenting him at a distance; welcoming him with touching fondness and docility. When didst thou, like the pampered courser, repay thy master's care, by hurling him over thy ears, to the peril of his neck? When, through perversity and impatience, didst thou dash to pieces with thy heels his newly-painted trundle-car, or respectability-gig? And when, pressed by the sharp pangs of hunger, thou hast ventured to crop a forbidden cabbage leaf from his kitchen-garden, was that a crime so atrocious as to merit the cruel cudgelling thou receivedst from his too liberal hand?

Ungainly thou art, I must allow. In the graces, nature has been to thee a niggard. Yet she has 'made it up' to thee. Thou hast many nameless virtues;' and those that are not nameless-sagacity, hardihood, sure-footedness. What were man, with all his boasted reason, in the wild, intricate passes of the Cordilleras, but for thee? How had the silver of Potosi found its way to the sea-board, but for thy agency? Art thou dull? We forget the solemn wisdom of thy rebuke to Baalam! True, thou wert then inspired; but what other animal was ever inspired as thou wert? Devils took possession of swine; but thou wert possessed of a God! Art thou called dull, then, because thou art not a horse?

Yet

The horse is the only favorite, and all care and expense on him are lavished. He is luxuriously fed, warmly stabled, carefully tended; whilst thou art abandoned to neglect; the property of the poor or the vicious; the sport of dogs and children. were there no horses, thou wouldst be esteemed first of quadrupeds. Thou art only second, and for that, art despised and neglected. We know thou hast not the courser's grace, bearing, fire. Thou wouldst make but a sorry charger in war. Thou couldst not well be the Bucephalus to any mad Alexander. No Napoleon bestrode thee at Austerlitz - -no Wellington at Waterloo. Such were not thy vocation. Thy destiny is a more humble one; but dost thou not fulfil it as well? Thou hast less activity than the courser, but thy passivity' could not be excelled. Thy great virtue lies in endurance. Thy cousin-german proudly prances beneath the gorgeous weight of princes and warriors; more humbly thou troitest soberly along, under honester men. Thy peasant masters could not often afford to exchange thee for the showier but less useful animal. Nay, didst thou not once bear upon thy back that wonderous peasant of Nazareth, before whom princes and potentates were but the gilded ephemera of an hour?

"Tell ye the daughter of Zion, Behold, thy King cometh, meek, and sitting upon an ass !' went forth in thunder-words to all the earth. Not like the vainly-expected Messiah,