"Have you forgotten, General," the battered soldier cried, "The days of eighteen hundred twelve, when I was at your side? Have you forgotten Johnson, who fought at Lundy's Lane? "T is true, I'm old and pension'd, but I want to fight again."

"Have I forgotten?" said the Chief; "my brave old soldier, no! And here's the hand I gave you then, and let it tell you so; But you have done your share, my friend; you're crippled, old, and gray,

And we have need of younger arms and fresher blood to-day."

"But, General," cried the veteran, a flush upon his brow, "The very men who fought with us, they say, are traitors now; They've torn the flag of Lundy's Lane, our old red, white, and

blue,

And while a drop of blood is left, I'll show that drop is true.

"I'm not so weak but I can strike, and I've a good old gun,
To get the range of traitors' hearts, and prick them, one by one.
Your Minié rifles and such arms it ain't worth while to try;
I couldn't get the hang o' them, but I'll keep my powder dry."

"God bless you, comrade!" said the Chief-"God bless your loyal heart!

But younger men are in the field, and claim to have a part; They'll plant our sacred banner firm in each rebellious town, And woe, henceforth, to any hand that dares to pull it down!"

"But, General," still persisting, the weeping veteran cried,
"I'm young enough to follow, so long as you're my guide;
And some, you know, must bite the dust, and that, at least can I;
So, give the young ones place to fight, but me a place to die!

"If they should fire on Pickens, let the colonel in command
Put me upon the rampart with the flag-staff in my hand:
No odds how hot the cannon-smoke, or how the shell may fly,
I'll hold the Stars and Stripes aloft, and hold them till I die!

"I'm ready, General; so you let a post to me be given, Where Washington can look at me, as he looks down from heaven,

And say to Putnam at his side, or, may be, General Wayne"There stands old Billy Johnson, who fought at Lundy's Lane.'

"And when the fight is raging hot, before the traitors fly-
When shell and ball are screeching, and bursting in the sky,
If any shot should pierce through me, and lay me on my face,
My soul would go to Washington's, and not to Arnold's place!"

HE

NAPOLEON BONAPARTE.

E is fallen! We may now pause before that splendid prodigy, which towered among us like some ancient ruin, whose frown terrified the glance its magnificence attracted. Grand, gloomy, and peculiar, he sat upon the throne, a sceptred hermit, wrapt in the solitude of his own originality. A mind, bold, independent, and decisive a will, despotic in its dictates - an energy that distanced expedition, and a conscience pliable to every touch of interest, marked the outline of this extraordinary character-the most extraordinary, perhaps, that, in the annals of this world, ever rose, or reigned, or fell.

-

Flung into life in the midst of a revolution that quickened every energy of a people who acknowledge no superior, he commenced his course, a stranger by birth, and a scholar by charity! With no friend but his sword, and no fortune but his talents, he rushed into the lists where rank and wealth and genius had arrayed themselves, and competition fled from him as from the glance of destiny. He knew no motive but interest - he acknowledged no criterion but success he worshipped no God but ambition, and, with an Eastern devotion, he knelt at the shrine of his idolatry.

Subsidiary to this, there was no creed that he did not profess, there was no opinion that he did not promulgate; in the hope of a dynasty, he upheld the Crescent; for the sake of a divorce, he bowed before the Cross; the orphan of St. Louis, he became the adopted child of the Republic; and, with a parricidal ingratitude, on the ruins both of the throne and tribune, he reared the throne of his despotism. A professed Catholic, he imprisoned the Pope; a pretended patriot, he impoverished the country; and, in the

name of Brutus, he grasped without remorse and wore without shame the diadem of the Cæsars! Through this pantomime of policy, fortune played the clown to his caprices. At his touch, crowns crumbled, beggars reigned, systems vanished, the wildest theories took the color of his whim, and all that was venerable, and all that was novel, changed places with the rapidity of a drama.

Even apparent defeat assumed the appearance of victory - his flight from Egypt confirmed his destiny - ruin itself only elevated him to empire. But, if his fortune was great, his genius was transcendent; decision flashed upon his counsels; and it was the same to decide and to perform. To inferior intellects his combinations appeared perfectly impossible, his plans perfectly impracticable; but, in his hands, simplicity marked their development, and success vindicated their adoption. His person partook the character of his mind-if the one never yielded in the cabinet, the other never bent in the field. Nature had no obstacle that he did not surmount-space no opposition that he did not spurn; and whether amid Alpine rocks, Arabian sands, or Polar snows, he seemed proof against peril, and empowered with ubiquity!

The whole continent trembled at beholding the audacity of his designs, and the miracle of their execution. Skepticism bowed to the prodigies of his performance; romance assumed the air of history; nor was there aught too incredible for belief, or too fanciful for expectation, when the world saw a subaltern of Corsica waving his imperial flag over her most ancient capitals. All the visions of antiquity became commonplaces in his contemplation; kings were his people - nations were his outposts; and he disposed of courts, and crowns, and camps, and churches, and cabinets, as if they were titular dignitaries of the chess-board! Amid all these changes, he stood immutable as adamant.

It mattered little whether in the field or in the drawing-room -with the mob or the levee-wearing the Jacobin bonnet or the iron crown-banishing a Braganza, or espousing a Hapsburg dictating peace on a raft to the Czar of Russia, or contemplating defeat at the gallows of Leipsic - he was still the same military despot!

-

In this wonderful combination, his affectations of literature

--

must not be omitted. The jailer of the press, he affected the patronage of letters-the proscriber of books, he encouraged philosophy the persecutor of authors and the murderer of printers, he yet pretended to the protection of learning! Such a medley of contradictions, and, at the same time, such an individual consistency, were never united in the same character. A royalist a republican and an emperor -a Mohammedan Catholic and a patron of the synagogue—a subaltern and a sovereign a traitor and a tyrant- a Christian and an infidel-he was, through all his vicissitudes, the same stern, impatient, inflexible original- the same mysterious, incomprehensible self - the man without a model, and without a shadow.

EXTRACT FROM THANATOPSIS.

YO live, that, when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan, that moves

S

To that mysterious realm where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,

Thou go not like the quarry-slave at night

Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave
Like one that draws the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.

A

THE SMACK IN SCHOOL.

DISTRICT school, not far away,
'Mid Berkshire hills, one winter's day,
Was humming with its wonted noise
Of threescore mingled girls and boys;
Some few upon their tasks intent,
But more on furtive mischief bent.
The while the master's downward look
Was fastened on a copy-book:

When suddenly, behind his back,

Rose sharp and clear a rousing smack!
As 't were a battery of bliss

Let off in one tremendous kiss!

"What's that?" the startled master cries;
"That, thir," a little imp replies,

"Wath William Willith, if you pleathe-
I thaw him kith Thuthanna Peathe!"
With frown to make a statue thrill,
The master thundered, "Hither, Will!"
Like wretch o'ertaken in his track,
With stolen chattels on his back,
Will hung his head in fear and shame,
And to the awful presence came―
A great, green, bashful simpleton,
The butt of all good-natured fun.

With smile suppressed, and birch upraised,
The threatener faltered-"I'm amazed
That you, my biggest pupil, should

Be guilty of an act so rude!

Before the whole set school to boot —
What evil genius put you to 't?"
"'Twas she, herself, sir," sobbed the lad;
"I did not mean to be so bad;
But when Susannah shook her curls,
And whispered, I was 'fraid of girls,
And dursn't kiss a baby's doll,
I couldn't stand it, sir, at all,
But up and kissed her on the spot!
I know-boo-hoo-I ought to not,
But somehow from her looks-boo-hoo-
I thought she kind o' wished me to!"

THE FIREMAN.

HE city slumbers. O'er its mighty walls
Night's dusky mantle, soft and silent, falls;

Sleep o'er the world slow waves its wand of lead,
And ready torpors wrap each sinking head.