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THE TALISMAN.

WORCESTER, SATURDAY, SEPT. 6, 1828.

SUMMARY OF NEWS.

"NEW AMERICan Gardner.”—The high reputation which Mr. Fessenden the author of this book (and also of the New England Farmer,) has acquired as a writer and compiler of matter appertaining to both theoretical and practical agriculture, is a sufficient warrantee of the value and usefulness of this work to those who have a taste for gardening. The article on fruit trees is particularly valuable to our farmers. Those persons who wish to profit by the experience of others in the management of fruit trees or a garden will derive more practi- ' cal information from this book, than from any other on the same subjects that we know of.

Hard Question.-The Editor of "The Moralist," (Southbridge,) very gravely asks, what shall we write ?" and says, “The compositor is

his stick." Surely the Editor never was known to use a more appropriate term for his own writings than the foregoing. "Bot, Masters I am to discourse wonders: but ask me not what; for, if I tell you, I am no true athenian. I will tell you every thing right as it fell out." Shaks.

POETRY.

FOR THE TALISMAN.

An unfortunate difficulty has arisen between the Common Council and Firemen of New York; and we learn that a few days since the latter actually stood by and saw two buildings consumed, without a single effort to extinguish the flames. It is quite the fashion at present for every brother quill who can leave his desk for a few days journey, to entertain his patrons with an account of his travels.We too have travelled, but start not good reader, we have no intention of boring you with a long account of the wonders we have seen and the "hair breadth scapes" we have passed, but shall, in as few words as possible state the result-we enjoyed the journey high-waiting for to put the editorial scribblings into ly, met fair weather and foul,passed over rough roads and smooth, saw hills, vallies, plains, rivers, swamps and last not least, sailed o'er "the vasty deep," and finally came home contented. Russia and Turkey-Brahilow has surrendered to the Russians after a sharp conflict, they were repulsed in their assault upon the place, and after an armistice, the Turks gave up the town on the 18th June, three days after the assault. Gen. Lafayette was present at the last celebration of American Inde"After twenty-five days of excessive fatigue pendence in Paris. The plague is said to have they came to the last mountain. Up this he made its appearance among the crews of the went alone, being determined that none should Russian fleet in the Mediterranean. A young rob him of the first sight. He attained the man has been fined $10 and costs at Spring-summit, from whence he saw the vast Pacific, rolling beneath his feet." field, for taking three sweet apples from a farmer's orchard. The crops in some parts of England have been seriously injured by heavy rains. "Notions of Americans picked up by a travelling bachelor," is the title of Cooper's new work; it is spoken well of by American writers and ridiculed and criticised by English writers, who know nothing of the people about whom they are ranting save only through the medium of their own public prints. How is it possible for an Englishman who has never perhaps, been without the smoky precincts of London, to say with the least shadow of truth "that the good sense of America will reject this gasconading gallimafraw with more derision and dislike than, it can excite in any other quarter of the globe." This is of a piece with other of John Bull's impudent assertions calculated to supply the want of truth.

BALBOA'S FIRST SIGHT OF THE SEA.

He stood on Andes' rock-ribbed mount,
The first who there had been,
And looking down upon the fount

Of billowy waters green,
He felt his bounding bosom swell

With warm emotions, but the spell
Of strange, extatic pleasure broke,
And warm with heart-felt joy he spoke.
"I am the first, I am the first,

Who e'er upon this summit stood,
And saw upon his vision burst
The high waves of this boundless flo od.
Yon sun is o'er me, I have seen

His golden streams in other climes;
Earth smiles around me, I have been
Where 'twas as bright in by-gone times;

But ocean, man's enraptured eyes
Ne'er rested on thy wave before,
And heart ne'er felt that glad surprise
Of him who now is on thy shore.

Yes, I behold thee in the pride

Of nature's first untrodden state, As, heaving high, thy briny tide

In mountains rolls, sublimely great.

Man has not known thee, that deep wave Ne'er heard the shouting seaman's call; And thy dark abyss, it ne'er gave

A covering to the sailor's pall.

Then hurry on in pomp and power,
In conscious innocence and glee,
Till time shall usher in the hour,

When man shall prove him worthy thee.

For time shall come, O hail the day!
When thou shalt bear, at man's command,
The stately vessel on its way,

In mighty pride from land to land.

Then fare thee well; when time has rolled--
When many a future age is o'er-
When man's bold prowess long hath told
That thou art known to human lore,

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FROM THE TOILET.

THE INTEMPERATE HUSBAND, How often have the beautiful lines of PERCIVAL expressed the agonies of a wounded and still affectionate heart.

He comes not-I have watch'd the moon go down,

And yet he comes not-once it was not so.
He thinks not how these bitter tears do flow,
The while he holds his riot in that town.
Yet he will come and chide, and I shall weep,
And he will wake my infant from its sleep,
To blend its feeble wailing with my tears.
O! how I love a mother's watch to keep
Over those sleeping eyes, that smile which

cheers

My heart, though sunk in sorrow, fixed and deep.

I had a husband once, who lov'd me-now
He ever wears a frown upon his brow,
And feeds his passion on a wanton's lip,
As bees from laurel flowers poison sip :
But I cannot hate-O! there were hours,
When I could hang forever on his eye,
And time, who stole with silent sweetness by,
Strewed, as he hurried on, his path with flow-

ers.

I lov'd him then-he lov'd me too-my heart
Still finds its fondness kindle if he smile!
The memory of our loves will ne'er depart;
And though he often sting me with a dart,
Venom'd and barb'd, and waste upon the
vile.

Caresses which his babe and mine should share;

Though he should spurn me, I will calmly

bear

His maduess-and should sickness come, and lay

Its paralizing hand upon him, then

I would, with kindness, all my wrongs repay, Until the penitent should weep, and say, How injured and how faithful I have been.

Married,

In Shrewsbury, on Sunday evening last, by Rev. Mr. Allen, Mr. William Legate, of this town, to Miss Nancy D. Phelps, daughter of Capt. Azor Phelps.

Died,

In this town, Sept. 2, Southworth A. son of Mr. Southworth A. Howland, aged 2 years and 2 months.

WORCESTER TALISMAN. Published every other Saturday morning, by DORR & HOWLAND, Worcester, (Mass.) at $1 a year, payable in advance.

Agents paying five dollars will be entiled to receive SIX copies.

Letters, intended for THE TALISMAN, must be post paid to insure attention.

GRIFFIN AND MORRILL....PRINTERS.

THE

Worcester Talisman.

NO. 13.

SEPTEMBER 20, 1828.

POPULAR TALES.

FOR THE TALISMAN.
ALFRED ANSON.

VOL. I.

site in their natures; William carried even in his countenance, that expression which evinces firmness and decision; and in his heart, the power to resist the temptations of the world. Alfred, on the contrary, although he knew the distinction between right and wrong, and would fain choose the better way, had not the manly decision to resist a temptation which came under a garb of pretended friendship, unless immediately under the eye of his friend, and fortunate indeed it was for him that he had made choice of so valuable a person for his friend. Time passed on, the friends grew up to the cheerful dawn of manhood, but at length a circumstance, unfortunate indeed to Alfred, compelled his friend to remove far into the interior of the state, to reside many months. Their parting was truly severe; yet not so much so to William as to his friend,as he was going upon a journey, his attention, while on the road, would naturally be more turned towards the ever-changing scenery of the country through which he travelled, than reflecting upon his home and friends, with all their endearing associations which he had left behind. Alfred was left upon the scene of his youth, to pursue the same routine of occupation, with nothing new to divert himself, and deprived of the society of him, who shar

Among those superior qualities which are either naturally inherent in man, or nursed up beneath the genial influence of his own sound mind and well directed judgment-perhaps there is no one which is more essential to the security of character, or our own happiness through life, than self-denial. It is one of those requisites, without which, though possessed of most others, man seems to be unqual- || ified for passing safely through the numberless temptations, allurements and vices, which so strongly characterize this "sublunary world." Still, notwithstanding it is necessary to constitute a perfect man. How unfrequently do we meet with it, to that degree with which we might desire that every one should be possessed of it. Yet, self-denial is a passion, if it may so be termed, which is almost wholly at the disposal of man. Its seed is planted by Nature in his heart, and the power given him to water and to nourish it, or to leave it unmolested in its primitive state. Therefore, as we may daily witness, if guided by reason, he chooses to cultivate this seed, it flourishes and increases, but otherwise, if he permits it to lie unheeded and neglected, in a few shorted a portion of his heart. Yet, he felt that years it withers, decays, dies and is forgotten. There are individuals, however, who fain would cherish this inward principle, and be shielded by its influence, but, owing to a weakness in their natures, their efforts are paralyzed and their endeavors fruitless. Of such a cast was he whose history shall now be given.|| Alfred Anson was a young man of warm and generous feelings. In his friendship he was ardent even unto enthusiasm, and he had the power, although young, of selecting those for his companions, whose natural inclinations led them to virtue rather than vice. But, situated as he was in the world, his acquaintance was extremely limited, and his firmest and most regarded friend was one for whom his attachment had commenced in early life. William Ainsworth was nearly the age of Alfred; their introduction to each other was while enjoying the youthful merriments of the street, and the friendship which was then plighted between them, grew firm with increasing age. But yet, there was something entirely oppo

absence could not "break the tie that binds the hearts of friends," and though William was absent, he felt that they were not entirely separated. They had still one resource left, by which they might exchange their feelings and their sentiments,-through that most useful art, the art of writing, by which those who are in distant and far separated lands can "hold sweet converse," and hearts separated by the rugged hills of many countries, can commune together. In this Alfred found a partial antidote for his sorrows: but, accustomed as he had been, to have a friend constantly with him, unto whom he might reveal the whole workings of his bosom, he soon resolved to mingle in new company, and choose another, a present confidential companion.But, alas, he went forth into the crowd, and finally was allured, unsuspectingly, to mingle with those unprincipled gangs which surround the gaming table, and throng the shops of liquor. He went, not that his inclination directed him there, but by falling into the ac

that it were but the fanciful vision of a midnight dream! but no, I am too well assured of the reality, for intemperance will never acknowledge itself, unti! upon the brink of dis

our friendship, by every thing which thou holdest dear upon earth, return to that mode of life in which I left thee. Shrink with horror from the gulf that is yawning before thee. Farewell; I shall return to the home of my fathers as soon as possible, and shail still indulge the hope of finding thee as thou wert formerly. WILLIAM."

But alas, in vain did he cherish so fond a hope. Alfred's conduct, together with the anguish of his mind, threw him into a quick consumption, which hastened him to the grave, and William returned, only to pluck the first blossom of spring which grew near the little mound that covered the ashes of his unfortunate friend. CLARENCE.

quaintance of one, who flattered and pretended friendship. He followed this enemy to his future happiness to the den of midnight revelry. The destroying bowl, the inebriating draught, the poisonous cup of in-truction. Return then I conjure thee, by all temperance came to his lips,-he sippedhis absent friend and his admonitions, together with an inborn sense of doing wrong, rushed like a torrent upon his heart, and he dashed the bowl away, with a brief determination of leaving it forever. But he had been led into an inextricable maze, into the labrinth of vice, the wild of intemperance. His good resolutions weighed but an atom in the balance, when opposed by the flattery and enticements of his false friend, and he was, imperceptibly to himself, hastening forward with an accellerated step towards the vortex of destruction. At length, the gaming table, and the expense of the revelling to which he had been accustomed, began to bring around his walls the ghastly heralds of poverty. Wretchedness, ruin and despair grinned horribly before his eyes. In his more sober and serious intervals, he would answer the epistle of his friend in such a manner, that nothing could be suspected, and William would have remained in total ignorance of his circumstances, had he not been apprised of them, from his own paternal mansion. But he was not aware of the real situation of his friend, until Alfred, finding his case desperate, and his destruction inevitable, sat down in an overwhelming paroxysm of mingled emotions and pourtrayed to William, in glowing colors the sad reality. His letter concluded thus.-" Hasten then, O hasten my beloved, thou to whose breast I have forever clung, as the feeble ivy clings to the giant oak. Hasten, for the verdure of the ivy has withered, the chill blasts of penury, of wretchedness, and must I say of intemperance have rushed along, and swept its garlands far away. Then hasten, for the

vine itself is decaying; no longer shielded by the support of the towering oak, it is fast hastening down to mingle with its native dust.Come ere the last spark of life is totally extinguished, come and soothe the sorrows that weigh heavily upon this bosom, come quiet this haggard brow, and smooth the dying pillow of thy unfortunate, ungrateful, but loving friend,-Alfred."

This was a thunderstroke to William; as has been said before, he had been informed of the deviation of Alfred from the paths of virtue, but was not acquainted with his real situation, and such a change, coming so suddenly as it did, could not but awaken strong and powerful emotions. After the first intensity of the shock had subsided, he hastened to return an answer, which, though brief, spoke the whole language of his heart; an extract is given.

"O, Alfred, thou hast fallen upon the rock upon which I always feared thy gallant bark would wreck; my fearful anticipations have been too truly, too sadly realized. Would

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THE HUMOROUS MAN. You shall know the man I speak of by the vivacity of his eye, the morn-elastic' tread of his foot, the lightness of his brow, and the The muscles of his mouth, unlike those of dawning smile of pleasantry in his countenance. Monsieur Melancholy, (whose mouth has a 'downward drag austere,') curl upward like a Spaniard's mustachios. He is a man who cares for nothing so much as a mirth-moving jest; give him that, and he has food and raiment.' He will not see what men have to care for, beyond to-day; and is for Tomorrow's

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providing for himself. He is also for a new reading of Johnson's old play of 'Every Man in his humor; he would have it Every Man in Humor.' He leaves money and misery,to misers; ambition and blood to warriors and highwaymen ; fame, to courtlaureate and lord-mayknights; the dread of death, to such as are ors; honors, to court-panders and city not worthy of life; the dread of heaven, to those who are not good enough even for earth; the grave, to parish-clerks and undertakers; tombs, to proud-worms; and palaces to pau

pers.

It is enough for him if he may laugh the 'hours away;' and break a jest, where tempers more humorous break a head. He would not barter with you one wakeful jest for a hundred sleepy sermons; or one laugh for a thousand sighs. He says, that if he could allow himself to sigh about any thing, it would be that he had been serious when he might have laughed; if he could weep for any thing, it would be for mankind, because they will not laugh more and lament less.-Yet he hath tears for the orphan and the unhappy; but his tears die even where they are born,-in his heart of hearts; he makes no show of them; like April showers, they refresh where they fall, and turn to smiles, as all tears will that are not selfish. His grief has a humanity in it,

to a blank valentine; a shell without a nut ; a courtezan in a fair Quaker's chaste satinity and smooth sleekness; the arch devil in a domino-the other is, as he describes it, taking the hat and cloak of your heart off, and standing uncovered and unconcealed in the presence of worth, beauty, or any other amiable quality.

Thus he unites humor with seriousness, and seriousness with humor.

which is not satisfied with tears only; it teaches him the difference between poverty and riches, between wealth and want, and moves his heart to pity, and his hand to charity. He loves no face more than a smiling one; a needlessly serious one serves him for the kindling of his wit, as cold flints strike out sparks of fire. His humor shows itself to all men and on all occasions. I once found him bowing on the stairs to a poor alarmed devil of a rat, who was cringing up in a corner; he was offering him the retreat honourable, with a polite 'After you, Sir, if you would oblige me.' I settled the point of etiquette, by kicking the rat down stairs and received a frown from my humane friend, for my impatient inhumanity. It must have been my humorous friend, and not the atrabilarious Bard of Twickenham, who, coming to a corn-field,pulled off his hat, and bowing profoundly, requested of his whea-quette that would, perhaps, have cured Lord ten audience' that as he was a poor poet, they would lend him their ears.

His opinions of men and things have some spice of singularity in them. He conceives it to be a kind of pupyism in pigs that they wear tails. He defines a great coat to be a modern Spenser, in folio, with tailpieces. He calls Hercules a man-midwife, in a small way of business; because he had but twelve labours. He can tell you why Horace ran away from the battle of Philippi: it was to convince the Romans that he was not a lame poet. He describes critics to be a sort of door-keepers to the temple of fame; and says it is their business to see that no persons slip in with holes in their stockings, or paste buckles for diamond one-not that they always perform this duty honestly.

In short, he is a humane man; and humanity is the only true politeness. I have seen him ridicule that politeness which contents itself with bowing and bending the back very humorously. In walking through his garden, a tree or tall flower, touched by the passing wind, bowed its head towards him his hat was immediately off, and the bow returned with an old-school ceremoniousness and eti

Chesterfield, that fine polisher of exteriors, of some of his hollow notions of manners. In this spirit,I saw him bow very profoundly to the giants, as he passed under St. Dunstan's Ichurch. He had asked his friend what was the hour; but before he could reply, the giants had informed him: Thank you, gentlemen,' said he, bowing to them with a graceful huHe once

mour.

I have said he is a humane man. detected an unintimate cat picking his cold mutton, on a day alack the day!' for he was then to poor to spare it well. Some men would have thrown a poker at her; others would have squandered away a gentlemanly income of oaths, and then have sworn by private subscription all the rest of their lives; an absent man perhaps would have thrown his He asserts that the highest delight on this side young son and heir, or his gold watch and the grave, is to possess a pair of bagpipes, and seals, at her; another, perhaps, his wig:-he know that no one within forty miles can play contented himself with saying, 'I have two or them. Acting up to this whim, he bought a three doubts (which I shall put forth as much pair of a Scotch bag-piper, a poor Highlander, in the shape of a half-crown pamphlet as posgiving him five guineas for them; which, as sible) as to the propriety of your conduct in he boasted, sent him home like a gentleman eating my mutton;' and then he brushed her to Scotland, where he had, no doubt, purchas-off with his handkerchief, supped with his ed a landed estate, and was in a probable way head out of window, and went happy to bed. of coming into parliament for a Scotch bor- Some of his jokes have a practicality about ough. And here he somewhat varied the old them; but they have neither the quarter-staff proverb, by saying, that 'It was an ill bag-jocoseness of Robin Hood, that brake heads let pipe that blowed nobody good.' Indeed, if he quotes a proverb at all, it is, with a difference.'

He is a polite, man though a wit-which is not what wits usually are; they would rather lose a life than a joke. I have heard him express his detestation of those wits who sport with venomed weapons, and wish them the fate of Laertes, who, in his encounter with Hamlet, had his weapon changed, and was himself wounded with the poisoned foil designed for his antagonist. I mean by saying he is a polite man, that he is naturally, not artificially, polite; for the one is but a handsome, frank-looking mask, under which you conceal the contempt felt for the person you seem most diligent to please; it is a gilt-edged envelope I

them have been never so obtuse and profound; nor the striking effect of that flourishing sprig of the green Isle, that knocks down friend and foe with a partiality truly impartial.

He is no respecter of persons: the beggar may have a joke of him, (and something better,) though he do not happen to apply exactly between the hours of eleven and four.'

At dinner, there is but one glass on the table his lady apologizes for her seeming negligence;- Time, my dear, hath no more than one glass; and yet he contrives to see all his guests under the table-kings, lord-mayors, and pot-boys.'

If he lends you a book, for the humor of the thing, he will request you, as you love a clean conscience, to make no thumb-and-butter ref

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