I stand on the verge of the brook, which seems to me more beautiful than any other brook on earth, and take my last survey of the home of my infancy. The cloud, which has been hovering above the trees on the verge of heaven, opens; the golden light gushes forth, bathing the hill-top, and streaming down its green declivity even to my feet; and I accept the encouraging omen. The angel of Alderbrook, "the ministering spirit" sent hither by the Almighty, blesses me. Father in heaven, thy blessing, ere I go! Hopes full of glory, and oh, most sweetly sacred! look out upon me from the future; but, for a moment, their beauty is clouded. My heart is heavy with sorrow. The cup at my lip is very bitter. Heaven help me! White hairs are bending in submissive grief, and age-dimmed eyes are made dimmer by the gathering of tears. Young spirits have lost their joyousness, young lips forget to smile, and bounding hearts and bounding feet are stilled. Oh, the rending of ties, knitted at the first opening of the infant eye and strengthened by numberless acts of love, is a sorrowful thing! To make the grave the only door to a meeting with those in whose bosoms we nestled, in whose hearts we trusted long before we knew how precious was such love and trust, brings with it an overpowering weight of solemnity. But a grave is yawning for each one of us; and is it much to choose whether we sever the tie that binds us here, to-day, or lie down on the morrow? Ah, the "weaver's shuttle" is flying; the "flower of the grass" is withering; the span is almost measured; the tale nearly told; the dark valley is close before us - tread we with care! My mother, we may neither of us close the other's darkened eye, and fold the cold hands upon the bosom; we may neither of us watch the sod greening and withering above the other's ashes; but there are duties for us even more sacred than these. But a few steps, mother-difficult the path may be, but very bright-and then we put on the robe of immortality, and meet to part nevermore. And we shall not be apart even on earth. There is an electric chain passing from heart to heart through the throne of the Eternal; and we may keep its links all brightly burnished by the breath of prayer. Still pray for me, mother, as in days gone by. Thou bidst me go. The smile comes again to thy lip and the light to thine eye, for thou hast pleasure in the sacrifice. blessing! Farewell, my mother, and ye loved ones of the same hearth-stone! Thy Bright, beautiful, dear Alderbrook, farewell! June 1, 1846. MY BIRD. Ere last year's moon had left the sky, A birdling sought my Indian nest, And folded, oh! so lovingly, Its tiny wings upon my breast. From morn till evening's purple tinge, In winsome helplessness she lies; Two rose-leaves, with a silken fringe, Shut softly on her starry eyes. There's not in Ind a lovelier bird; Broad earth owns not a happier nest, O God, thou hast a fountain stirred, Whose waters never more shall rest! This beautiful, mysterious thing, This seeming visitant from Heaven, This bird with the immortal wing, To me to me, thy hand has given. The pulse first caught its tiny stroke, The blood its crimson bue, from mine. This life, which I have dared invoke, Henceforth is parallel with thine. A silent awe is in my room I tremble with delicious fear; Doubts, hopes, in eager tumult rise; THE TWO MAMMAS. Years since you had a dear mamma, Her Father, God, looked down from heaven "Come hither, child," he said, "and lean She had toiled long and wearily, And so her cheek grew wan and pale, Then dear papa grew sad at heart, But still he thought 'twould make her well, He did not know that God had called, And so she kissed her little boys, And Abby, Pwen, and Enna went - three upon the land, And three upon the sea! But poor mamma still paler grew, Then on a distant rocky isle, Where none but strangers rest. They broke the cold earth for her grave, And heaped it on her breast. And there they left her all alone, Her whom they loved so well! — Ah me! the mourning in that ship, I dare not try to tell! *Pwen and Enna, names of endearment among the Burmans, very commonly applied to children.--ED. And how they wept, and how they prayed, How one great grief came crushingly, At length they reached a distant shore, And Abby found a pleasant home, He talked of wretched heathen men, He told me of his darling boys, And would I be their new mamma, Of those, who for the Saviour's sake, And when I knew how good he was, I thought it would be sweet to live And look to dear papa for smiles, And hear him talk and pray; Oh, if your first mamma could see, "Twould glad her angel heart. I know, Mach do I love my darling boys, And much do you love me;Our Heavenly Father sent me here, Your new mamma to be. And if I closely follow him, I hope to lead you up to heaven, To join the angel bands. Then with papa, and both mammas, And her who went before, And Christ who loves you more than all, Ye'll dwell for ever more. Maulmain, 1849. K. KEAN, ELLEN, OBTAINED her celebrity as an actress under her maiden name, Miss Tree. She was born in 1805, in London, and first appeared at Covent Garden Theatre, 1823, when about eighteen years of age. She did not take the town by storm, as some actresses have burst into fame; but her graceful and lady-like manner won the good-will of her audience, and she rose in her profession by real merit, both of character and mind. In 1837, she visited America, and was very successful in her theatrical engagements. After her return to England, she married Charles Kean, an actor well known for his constant efforts to imitate the manner of his father, the distinguished Edmund Kean. Shortly after their marriage, Charles Kean and his wife came to America, and made a professional tour through the principal cities: the wife was greeted as an old favourite; but she was not the Ellen Tree whom the people had loved. Mrs. Kean now resides with her husband in England, having, we believe, retired from the stage. KEMBLE, FRANCES ANNE, Is THE daughter of Mr. Charles Kemble, an actor of high reputation, and for many years a favourite with the public. Dramatic talent appears a natural inheritance in the Kemble family: Mrs. Siddons, her brother John Kemble, and her niece, the subject of this sketch, have occupied by acclamation, the very highest places in their profession. Many of the other members have arisen above mediocrity as artists, among whom an honourable rank must be assigned to Mrs. Sartoris, who, before her marriage, was very favourably received as a singer under the name of Adelaide Kemble. Fanny Kemble was born in London, about the year 1813, and made her first appearance on the London boards in 1829, in the character of Juliet. The highest enthusiasm was excited in her favour. Her extreme youth, which admirably suited the impersonation, rendered her conception of the passion and poetry remarkable. The British public at once stamped her by their approval, as an actress of genius, and she became distinguished as a new star in the histrionic art. In 1832, Miss Kemble came with her father to the United States, where her theatrical career was marked by unbounded success, and her talents were warmly admired. In 1834, she was married to Pierce Butler, Esq., of Philadelphia, a gentleman of large fortune. The unhappy termination of this marriage is well known. After many domestic difficulties, a mutual divorce was granted the husband and wife in 1849, and Mrs. Butler immediately resumed her name of Kemble. We must, in justice, observe here, that Mrs. Kemble's bitterest enemies have never charged her with the slightest deviation from the laws of conjugal fidelity; that her fame is spotless, and her position in society exactly what it ever was. Mrs. Kemble is a woman of varied powers; she has been successful in literature, particularly in poetry; displaying an ardent impassioned fancy, which male critics consider the true fire of genius. Some of her shorter poems are wonderfully impressive; but she often mars what would otherwise be very charming, by epithets a little too Shaksperian, a little too much savouring of the art for which she was educated, and which are, to her, familiar expressions. Such words give a flavour, a taste of the antique, when read in their original places; we consider them inadmissible in the writings of a poet, a lady poet of our day; they appear like affectation or want of resource; and sometimes like want of delicacy. The drama first claimed the genius of Fanny Kemble. At a very early age she wrote a tragedy Francis the First," which has passed through ten editions. Her next work was The Star of Seville;" both have been acted with success; and evince a maturity of mind, and a range of reading very uncommon for a young lady. In 1834, appeared her first work in prose, a 66 'Journal," descriptive, chiefly, of the United States. The youthful petulance and foolish prejudices exhibited in this work have been, we believe, much regretted by the author; at any rate, her strictures have long ago ceased to trouble the people of America, and we leave the book to its quiet slumber in the past. In 1844, her "Poems" were published, and in 1847 appeared her second prose work, "A Year of Consolation;" being a description of her tour through France to Rome, and her residence in that city. In this, as in her former prose work, the strong feelings which Mrs. Kemble possesses, or, more properly speaking, which possess her, find large scope. She looks at the world through the medium of her own emotions, and whatever may be under discussion-the Pope, the people, or the pine swamps of Georgia, the chief point to be considered is what Mrs. Kemble suffered or enjoyed. Unfortunately, too, she is among those travellers who are nervously sensible to every desagrement; this is a constitutional defect, and as really deserving pity as poverty, or sickness, for like them, it prevents the enjoyment of life's varied current. A French wit has said of such "Ils meurent à cent ans, ayant toujours l'avenir devant euxregrettants le passé et se plaignent du present dont ils n'ont pas su jouér." When uninfluenced by these "noires vapeurs," Mrs. Kemble shows that she possesses a fund of good sense, and a heart filled with kind and benevolent affections. Her style is open to criticism; passages of exquisite beauty, chiefly descriptive, might be selectedbut she indulges in slang expressions and coarse epithets, that are entirely unwarrantable, coming from a woman of taste, and a poetess. Shakspeare "Readings," in which her remarkable versatility of powers is exhibited in a manner as striking, and more wonderful, than on the stage. Among her admirers, there are those, who, judging from her "readings," pronounce her the best Macbeth, and the truest Lear which have ever been applauded; while others deem she is inimitable in Falstaff. In 1850, she left America for England, and during the winter of 1851 was giving her Shaksperian "Readings" in London. We cannot but feel, while reviewing the events of Mrs. Kemble's career, that her purposes have been broken off, her plans of life disappointed, and her pursuits changed, before she had time or opportunity of doing the best she could in any one department of literature or art. We do not hold the opinion that genius is doomed to suffering; we trust brighter days are in store for Mrs. Kemble, and look forward to her mature years producing works that will hold a higher place in Female Literature than any she has yet published. As a woman of commanding genius, she might do much for her own sex-not by abjuring feminine delicacy of character, dress, or language, but by illustrating, as she could do-"the holiness that circles round a fair and virtuous woman," and the influence such may wield. From "A Year of Consolation." A NIGHT OF TERROR. My dismay and indignation were intense; the rain was pouring, the wind roaring, and it was twelve o'clock at night. The inn into which we were shown, was the most horrible cut-throat looking hole I ever beheld; all the members of the household were gone to bed, except a dirty, sleepy, stupid serving-girl, who ushered us into a kitchen as black as darkness itself and a single tallow-candle could make it, and then informed us that here we must pass the night, for that the coaches which generally came up to meet our conveyance, had not been able to come over the mountains on acconnt of the heavy snow for several days. I was excessively frightened; the look of the place was horrible, that of the people not at all encouraging; when the conducteur demanded the price of the coach, which I then recollected, the Chef de Bureau had most cautiously refused to receive, because then I should have found out that I was not going to Chalons in his coach, but to be shot out on the highest peak of the Morvan, midway between Chalons and Nevers. I refused to pay until, according to agreement, I was taken to Chalons; he then refused to deliver up my baggage, and I saw that all resistance was vain, whereupon I paid the money, and retreated again to the black filthy kitchen, where I had left poor bidding her not stir from the side of my dressingcase and writing-box I had left in her charge, with my precious letters of credit and money-bag. The fire of the kitchen was now invaded by a tall brawny-looking man in a sort of rough sporting costume; his gun and game-bags lay on the dresser; two abominable dogs he had with him went running in and out between our feet, pursu In 1849, Mrs. Kemble commenced a series of ing each other, and all but knocking us down. I was so terrified, disgusted, and annoyed, that I literally shook from head to foot, and could have found it in my heart to have cried for very cowardice. I asked this person what was to be done; he answered me that he was in the same predicament with myself, and that I could do, if I liked, as he should, walk over the mountain to Autun the next day. "What was the distance ?" "Ten leagues." (Thirty miles.) comfort as though she were the sister or the daughter of every man she meets. MY OWN SPIRIT. Up, and be doing," is the impulse for ever with me; and when I ask myself, both sadly and scornfully, what? both my nature and my convictions repeat the call, "up, and be doing;" for surely there is something to be done from morning till night, and to find out what, is the ap I smiled a sort of verjuice smile, and replied-pointed work of the onward-tending soul. "Even if we two women could walk thirty miles through the snow, what was to become of my baggage?" "Oh, he did not know; perhaps, if the snow was not higher than the horse's bellies, or if the labourers of the district had been clearing out the roads at all, the master of the house might contrive some means of sending us on." In the midst of the agony of perplexity and anxiety, which all these perhapses occasioned me, I heard that the devilish conductor and conveyance which had brought me to this horrid hole, would return to Nevers the next day at five o'clock, and making up my mind, if the worst came to the worst, to return by it thither, and having blown the perfidious Chef de Bureau of the country diligence higher than he had sent me in his coach, take the Paris diligence on its way through Nevers for Lyons straight,-this, of course, at the cost of so much time and money wasted. - With this alternative, I had my luggage carried up to my room, and followed it with my faithful and most invaluable who was neither discouraged, nor frightened, nor foolish, nor anything that I was, -but comported herself to admiration. The room we were shown into was fearful looking; the wind blew down the huge black gaping chimney, and sent the poor fire, we were endeavouring in vain to kindle, in eye-smarting clouds into our faces. The fender and fire-irons were rusty and broken, the ceiling cracked all over, the floor sunken, and an inch thick with filth and dirt. I threw open the shutters of the window, and saw opposite against the black sky, the yet thicker outline of the wretched hovels opposite, and satisfied, that at any rate we were in the vicinity of human beings of some description, we piled our trunks up against a door that opened into some other room, locked the one that gave entrance from the passage, and with one lighted tallow candle, and one relay, and a box of matches by my bed-side, I threw myself all dressed upon the bed. did the same upon a sofa, and thus we resigned ourselves to pass the night. ARRIVAL AT VALENCE-AMERICAN WOMAN. ROME. Here (as every where) we were pursued by the shameless, wretched pauperism that disgusts and pains one the whole time, and makes the ruined aspect of the great outward things about one cheerful, compared with the abject degradation of that which God has made in his own image. Oh! I would not live among these people for any thing in the world; and when I think of England and America, I thank God that I was born in the one, and shall live in the other. From Francis the First." A FAIR AND VIRTUOUS WOMAN. At those who do not feel the majesty, - I love that dear old home! My mother lived there Of ancient strength and state to prompt the memory I thought, too, of America, of the honour and Drawing a vigorous sap into their veins From "Poems." SONG. Yet once again, but once, before we sever, Joy's fleeting sun is set; and no to-morrow But one more look from those dear eyes, now shining Thro' their warm tears, their loveliest and their last; But one more strain of hands, in friendship twining, Now farewell all, save memory of the past. SONNET. Say thou not sadly, “never,” and “no more," Days, hours, and moments, that have unknown hoards Of joy, as well as sorrow: passing by, Smiles comes with tears; therefore with hopeful eye A MOTHER'S MEMORIES. The blossoms hang again upon the tree As when with their sweet breath they greeted me, Full of God's praise - they laid thee, treasure mine! Like a mysterious halo round that bed. Have steeped that memory in bitterest tears? Lovely and glorious, oh, my fair young tree? ABSENCE. What shall I do with all the days and hours Weary with longing shall I flee away, Shall love for thee lay on my soul the sin Of casting from me God's great gift of time? Shall I, these mists of memory lock'd within, Leave and forget life's purposes sublime? Oh! how, or by what means, shall I contrive To bring the hour that brings thee back more near? How shall I teach my drooping hope to live Until that blessed time, and thou art here? I'll tell thee; for thy sake I will lay hold All homeward flights, all high and holy strains, I will this dreary blank of absence make A noble task-time, and will therein strive To follow excellence, and to o'ertake So may this dooined time build up in me A thousand graces which shall thus be thine; LINES FROM THE ITALIAN. I planted in my heart one seed of love, KENT, DUCHESS OF, Is the sixth child and youngest daughter of Francis Duke of Saxe Saalfield Cobourg, and was born August 17th, 1786. She was married to Enrich Charles, hereditary Prince of Leiningen. Her husband died in 1814, leaving her with two children, the Prince of Leiningen, and the Princess Anna Feodoronna. She was then called to the regency, and her administration was popular and respected. In 1818, she married the Duke of Kent, son of George III., of England, and on the 24th of May, 1819, her only child by this marriage, Victoria, Queen of England, was born in Kensington Palace. To understand how deeply Great Britain is indebted to the Duchess of Kent, for the exceeding care she bestowed in training her illustrious daughter, so that she might be worthy to sway the sceptre of that great empire, some knowledge of the history of Victoria's father is indispensable. Edward, Duke of Kent, fourth son of George III., was, according to a reliable work, the noblest *The Life of Field Marshal his Royal Highness Ed. ward, Duke of Kent," &c By Erskine Neal, M. A., Rector of Kirton, &c. London: 1849. |