to this the story of the life and death of General Grant has more and more impressed and touched me.

I never allowed myself to make his acquaintance until he had quitted the White House. The period of his political activity was full of uncouth and unsparing partisan contention. It was a kind of civil war. I had my duty to do, and I did not dare trust myself to the subduing influence of what I was sure must follow friendly relations between such a man as he was and such a man as I knew myself to be. In this I was not mistaken, as the sequel proved. I met him for the first time beneath my own vine and fig tree, and a happy series of accidents thereafter gave me the opportunity to meet him often and to know him well. He was the embodiment of simplicity, integrity, and courage; every inch a general, a soldier, and a man; but in the circumstances of his last illness, a figure of heroic proportions for the contemplation of the ages. I recall nothing in history so sublime as the spectacle of that brave spirit, broken in fortune and in health, with the dread hand of the dark angel clutched about his throat, struggling with every breath to hold the clumsy, unfamiliar weapon with which he sought to wrest from the jaws of death something for the support of wife and children when he was gone! If he had done nothing else, that would have made his exit from the world an epic!

Gentlemen, soldiers, comrades, the silken folds that twine about us here, for all their soft and careless grace, are yet as strong as hooks of steel! They hold together a united people and a great

nation; for, realizing the truth at last - with no wounds to be healed and no stings of defeat to remember the South says to the North, as simply and as truly as was said three thousand years ago in that far-away meadow upon the margin of the mystic sea: "Whither thou goest, I will go and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God."

November chill blaws loud wi' angry sugh ;1
The short' ning winter-day is near a close;
The miry beasts retreating frae the pleugh:
The black'ning trains o' craws to their repose:
The toil-worn Cotter frae his labor goes,
This night his weekly moil is at an end,

Collects his spades, his mattocks, and his hoes, Hoping the morn2 in ease and rest to spend,

And weary, o'er the moor, his course does hameward bend.

At length his lonely cot appears in view,

Beneath the shelter of an aged tree;

Th' expectant wee things, toddlin', stachers through To meet their dad, wi' flichterin'

noise an' glee.

His wee bit ingle, blinkin' bonnily, 5

1 Moan.

2 Morrow.

3 Stagger.

4 Fluttering.

5 Fire-place.

His clean hearth-stane, his thrifty wifie's smile,
The lisping infant prattling on his knee,
Does a' his weary kiaugh1 and care beguile,
An' makes him quite forget his labor an' his toil.

Belyve, the elder bairns come drapping in,
At service out, amang the farmers roun';
Some ca' the pleugh, some herd, some tentie1 rin
A cannie5 errand to a neebor town:

Their eldest hope, their Jenny, woman grown,

In youthfu' bloom, love sparkling in her e'e,

6

Comes hame, perhaps, to shew a braw new gown, Or deposite her sair-won penny-fee,"

To help her parents dear, if they in hardship be.

Wi' joy unfeign'd, brothers and sisters meet,

And each for other's weelfare kindly spiers: 10 The social hours, swift-wing'd, unnoticed fleet; Each tells the uncos11 that he sees or hears ; The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years; Anticipation forward points the view.

The mother, wi' her needle an' her shears, Gars12 auld claes look amaist as weel's the new; The father mixes a' wi' admonition due.

Their master's an' their mistress's command,
The younkers a' are warned to obey;
An' mind their labors wi' an eydent13 hand,

An' ne'er, tho' out o' sight, to jauk1 or play: "An' O! be sure to fear the Lord alway!

4 Attentive.

1 Anxiety. 2 Presently. 3 Drive, i. e., with shouting or calling. 5 Requiring judgment. 6 Brave, fine, handsome. 7 De'posite, for depos'it. won, hard-earned. 9 Money-wages. 10 Enquires. 11 Unusual things, news. 13 Diligent. 14 Trifle.

8 Dear12 Makes.

An' mind your duty, duly, morn and night!
Lest in temptations path ye gang astray,
Implore his counsel and assisting might:

They never sought in vain that sought the Lord

1

The cheerfu' supper done, wi' serious face,
They, round the ingle, form a circle wide;
The sire turns o'er, wi' patriarchal grace,

The big ha'-Bible, 1 ance his father's pride:
His bonnet rev'rently is laid aside,

His lyart haffets wearing thin an' bare;

Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide, He wales a portion with judicious care;

And "Let us worship God!" he says, with solemn air.

They chant their artless notes in simple guise;

They tune their hearts, by far the noblest aim :
Perhaps "Dundee's" wild warbling measures rise,
Or plaintive "Martyrs," worthy of the name;
Or noble "Elgin" beets" the heavenward flame,
The sweetest far of Scotia's holy lays:

Compared with these, Italian trills are tame;
The tickl'd ears no heartfelt raptures raise;
Nae unison hae they with our Creator's praise.

The priest-like father reads the sacred page,
How Abram was the friend of God on high;
Or Moses bade eternal warfare wage

With Amalek's ungracious progeny;

Or how the royal bard did groaning lie

1 Hall Bible. 2 Gray, grayish. 3 Temples, here temple locks. 4 Chooses. 5 Feeds, nourishes.