changes of the habits and of the law of ordinary business. When half the business of life is transacted, as now, by checks, notes, bills, receipts, and all those informal evidences of contract that the old law contemptuously designated as mere "parole contracts," although written, the identity of spelling, like a certain similarity of handwriting, becomes of absolute necessity for all persons who have any business of any kind. In the older modes of life, where few transactions were valid without the attestation of a seal and witnesses, both law and usage were satisfied with the similarity of sounds (the idem sonans of the courts), and a man might vary his signature as he pleased. Thus the Poet could see no objection to having, like his own Falstaff, one name for his family and townsfolk, and another for the public-Shakspere for his domestic use and his concerns at Stratford-upon-Avon, and Shakespeare for the rest of England; we may add, though he did not, for posterity, and the whole world. IN Nicholas Biddle. BORN in Philadelphia, Penn., 1786. DIED there, 1844. OUR POLITICAL DEMAGOGUES. [Address before the Alumni of Nassau Hall. 1835.] N our country, too many young men rush into the arena of public life without adequate preparation. They go abroad because their home is cheerless. They fill their minds with the vulgar excitement of what they call politics, for the want of more genial stimulants within. Unable to sustain the rivalry of more disciplined intellects, they soon retire in disgust and mortification, or what is far worse, persevere after distinctions which they can now obtain only by artifice. They accordingly take refuge in leagues and factions, they rejoice in stratagems, they glory in combinations,-weapons all these, by which mediocrity revenges itself on the uncalculating manliness of genius and mines its way to power. Their knowledge of themselves inspires a low estimate of others. They distrust the judgment and the intelligence of the community, on whose passions alone they rely for advancement, and their only study is to watch the shifting currents of popular prejudice, and be ready at a moment's warning to follow them. For this purpose their theory is to have no principles and to give no opinions, never to do anything so marked as to be inconsistent with doing the direct reverse, and never to say anything not capable of contradictory explanations. They are thus disen cumbered for the race, and, as the ancient mathematician could have moved the world if he had had a place to stand on, they are sure of success if they have only room to turn. Accordingly, they worship cunning, which is only the counterfeit of wisdom, and deem themselves sagacious only because they are selfish. They believe that all generous sentiments of love of country, for which they feel no sympathy in their own breasts, are hollow pretences in others-that public life is a game in which success depends on dexterity and that all government is a mere struggle for place. They thus disarm ambition of its only fascination, the desire of authority in order to benefit the country; since they do not seek places to obtain power, but power to obtain places. Such persons may rise to great official stations, for high offices are like the tops of the pyramids, which reptiles can reach as well as eagles. But though they may gain places, they never can gain honors; they may be politicians, they never can become statesmen. The mystery of their success lies in their adroit management of our own weakness, just as the credulity of his audience makes half the juggler's skill. Personally and singly, objects of indifference, our collected merits are devoutly adored when we acquire the name of "the people." Our sovereignty, our virtues, our talents, are the daily themes of eulogy: they assure us that we are the best and wisest of the human race, that their highest glory is to be the instruments of our pleasure, and that they will never act nor think nor speak but as we direct them. If we name them to executive stations, they promise to execute only what we desire; if we send them to deliberative bodies, they engage never to deliberate, but to be guided solely by the light. of our intuitive wisdom. Startled at first by language, which, when addressed to other sovereigns, we are accustomed to ridicule for its abject sycophancy, constant repetition makes it less incredible. By degrees, although we may not believe all the praise, we cannot doubt the praiser, till at last we become so spoiled by adulation, that truth is unwelcome. If it comes from a stranger, it must be prejudice-if from a native, scarce less than treason; and when some unhappy traveller ventures to smile at follies which we will not see or dare not acknowledge, instead of disregarding it, or being amused by it, or profiting by it, we resent it as an indignity to our sovereign perfections. This childish sensitiveness would be only ludicrous if it did not expose us to the seduction of those who flatter us only till they are able to betray us-as men praise what they mean to sell-treating us like pagan idols, caressed till we have granted away our power, and then scourged for our impotence. Their pursuit of place has alienated them from the walks of honest industry-their anxiety for the public fortunes has dissipated their own. With nothing left either in their minds or means to retreat upon; having no self-esteem, and losing that of others, when they cease to possess authority, they acquire a servile love of sunshine, a dread of being what is called unpopular, that makes them the ready instruments of any chief who promises to be the strongest. They degenerate at last into mere demagogues, wandering about the political common, without a principle or a dollar, and anxious to dispose to the highest bidder of their only remaining possession, their popularity. If successful, they grow giddy with the frequent turns by which they rose, and wither into obscurity. If they miscalculate, if they fall into that fatal error-a minority-retirement, which is synonymous with disgrace, awaits them, while their more fortunate rivals, after flourishing for a season in a gaudy and feverish notoriety, are eclipsed by some fresher demagogue, some more popular man of the people. Such is the melancholy history of many persons, victims of an abortive ambition, whom more cultivation might have rendered useful and honorable citizens. Above this crowd and beyond them all stands that character which I trust more than one of you will become-a real American statesman. Lavinia Stoddard. BORN in Guilford, Conn., 1787. DIED at Blakeley, Ala., 1820. THE SOUL'S DEFIANCE. [Preserved in Griswold's "Female Poets of America."] SAID to Sorrow's awful storm, That beat against my breast, Rage on-thou may'st destroy this form, And lay it low at rest; But still the spirit that now brooks Thy tempest, raging high, Undaunted on its fury looks I said to Penury's meagre train, Yet still the spirit that endures Shall mock your force the while, And meet each cold, cold grasp of yours I said to cold Neglect and Scorn, Pass on-I heed you not; Ye may pursue me till my form Yet still the spirit, which you see I said to Friendship's menaced blow, To those already there; Yet still the spirit, that sustains Shall smile upon its keenest pains, I said to Death's uplifted dart, A weak, reluctant prey; For still the spirit, firm and free, Unruffled by this last dismay, “MR. Eliza Leslie. BORN in Philadelphia, Penn., 1787. DIED at Gloucester, N. J., 1858. THE SET OF CHINA. [Pencil Sketches. Second Series. 1835.] R. GUMMAGE," said Mrs. Atmore, as she entered a certain drawing-school, at that time the most fashionable in Philadel phia, "I have brought you a new pupil, my daughter, Miss Marianne Atmore. Have you a vacancy?" "Why, I can't say that I have," replied Mr. Gummage; "I never have vacancies." "I am very sorry to hear it," said Mrs. Atmore; and Miss Marianne, a tall, handsome girl of fifteen, looked disappointed. "But perhaps I could strain a point, and find a place for her," resumed Mr. Gummage, who knew very well that he never had the smallest idea of limiting the number of his pupils, and that if twenty more were to apply, he would take them every one, however full his school might be. "Do pray, Mr. Gummage," said Mrs. Atmore; "do try and make an exertion to admit my daughter; I shall regard it as a particular favor.” "Well, I believe she may come," replied Gummage: "I suppose I can take her. Has she any turn for drawing?" "I don't know," answered Mrs. Atmore, "she has never tried." "Well, madam," said Mr. Gummage, "what do you wish your daughter to learn? figures, flowers, or landscapes?" "Oh! all three," replied Mrs. Atmore. "We have been furnishing our new house, and I told Mr. Atmore that he need not get any pictures for the front parlor, as I would much prefer having them all painted by Marianne. She has been four quarters with Miss Julia, and has worked Friendship and Innocence, which cost, altogether, upwards of a hundred dollars. Do you know the piece, Mr. Gummage? There is a tomb with a weeping willow, and two ladies with long hair, one dressed in pink, the other in blue, holding a wreath between them over the top of the urn. The ladies are Friendship. Then on the right hand of the piece is a cottage, and an oak, and a little girl dressed in yellow, sitting on a green bank, and putting a wreath round the neck of a lamb. Nothing can be more natural than the lamb's wool. It is done entirely in French knots. The child and the lamb are Innocence." "Ay, ay," said Gummage, "I know the piece well enough-I've drawn them by dozens." "Well," continued Mrs. Atmore, "this satin piece hangs over the front parlor mantel. It is much prettier and better done than the one Miss Longstitch worked of Charlotte at the tomb of Werter, though she did sew silver spangles all over Charlotte's lilac gown, and used chenille, at a fi'-penny-bit a needleful, for all the banks and the large tree. Now, as the mantel-piece is provided for, I wish a landscape for each of the recesses, and a figure-piece to hang on each side of the large lookingglass, with flower-pieces under them, all by Marianne. Can she do all these in one quarter?" "No, that she can't," replied Gummage; "it will take her two quarters hard work, and maybe three, to get through the whole of them." "Well, I won't stand about a quarter more or less," said Mrs. Atmore; "but what I wish Marianne to do most particularly, and, indeed, the chief reason why I send her to drawing-school just now, is a pattern for a set of china that we are going to have made in Canton. I was told the other day by a New York lady (who was quite tired of the queer unmeaning things which are generally put on India ware), that she had sent a pattern for a tea-set, drawn by her daughter, and that every article came out with the identical device beautifully done on the china, |