And I, who woke each morrow to clasp hy hand in mine,
Who shared thy joy and sorrow, whose weal and woe were thine,
It should be mine to braid it around thy faded brow,

But I've in vain essayed it, and feel I cannot now.

While memory bids me weep thee, nor thoughts nor words are free, The grief is fixed too deeply that mourns a man like thee.

What highest prize hath woman won in science or in art? What mightiest work by woman done boasts city, field, or mart? "She hath no Raphael," Painting saith; no Newton," Learning

cries;

66

"Show us her steamship, her Macbeth, her thought-won victories!"

Wait, boastful man! though worthy are thy deeds, when thou art true,

Things worthier still, and holier far, our sister yet will do;
For this the worth of woman shows on every peopled shore,
Ever as man in wisdom grows, he honors her the more.

O, not for wealth, or fame, or power, hath man's meek angel striven,
But, silent as the growing flower, to make of earth a heaven!
And, in her garden of the sun, Heaven's brightest rose shall bloom:
For woman's best is unbegun, her advent yet to come!

Sleet! and Hail! and Thunder! and ye Winds that rave,
Till the sands thereunder tinge the sullen wave,
Winds, that, like a demon, howl with horrid note
Round the toiling seaman in his tossing boat,
From his humble dwelling, on the shingly shore,
Where the billows swelling keep such hollow roar,—
From that weeping woman, seeking with her cries
Succor superhuman from the frowning skies, -
From the urchin pining for his father's knee,
From the lattice shining-drive him out to sea!
Let broad leagues dissever him from yonder foam;
Ah! to think man ever comes too near his home!

No, they shall never have it, the free, the German Rhine!
Though, vulture-like, to seize it, with talons fierce, they pine:
So long as gently floating between its banks of green
A ship shall on the current of its dear stream be seen,
No, they shall never have it!

the glorious German Rhine,

While on its storied borders shall grow the oak and vine;
So long as the proud shadows of tall cliffs o'er it gleam,
So long as old cathedrals are imaged in its stream,
No, they shall never have it!

No, they shall never have it, the free, the German Rhine,

While round its graceful daughters the arms of strong men twine;
And while one fish within it springs glittering from the deep,
And while soft midnight music shall o'er its waters sweep;
No, they shall never have it, the German Rhine's free wave,
Till its sacred tide is flowing above the last man's grave!

5. BEAUTY AND THE DAWN. - Arndt.

I said unto the dawn, " Why art thou bright
With amber glow, and tints of rosy light?"

I said unto a maid, as morning fair,

“Why wreathe with smiles thy lip, with flowers thy hair? Beauty and morn! ye quickly must decay,

Soon fade your tints, and flit

your smiles away!

Therefore adorn not!"

"I deck myself," the Dawn replied, " in light,
In amber glow and roseate splendor bright,
In those rich hues rejoice to be arrayed,

Nor ask, nor know, when fate shall bid them fade;
He who the moon and stars ordained to shine
Made those rich hues and fading splendor mine,
Therefore I mourn not!"

"I deck myself," replied the beauteous maid,
"Ere yet the spring-time of my youth doth fade.
Shall that short spring in settled gloom be past
Because stern fate must bid it fade at last?
He who its plumage on the bird bestows,
Who gives, and takes, the colors of the rose,

In Him I trust, and mourn not!"

CLXIX. - THE COMPLAINT OF A PAIR OF LUNGS.

PART FIRST.

1. As you have given place to the recital of the grievances of a Stomach, we claim the privilege of being heard in regard to some of the abuses to which we, a respectable pair of Lungs,

* See page 157.

are subjected. If our worthy cousin, the Stomach, digests food, we have to digest air; and our province is quite as indispensable as his to health and life. We belong to a young lady, whom we have always endeavored to serve faithfully; but the trials, the injuries, the privations, to which she has exposed us, surpass all calculation.

2. Our principal business, as everybody knows, is to purify the blood by subjecting it to the action of the Oxygen of the atmosphere. It is upon the blood that the body depends for its existence, from moment to moment; and it is Oxygen which gives to the blood its healthy properties and bright color, and removes from it its impurities. The combination of the carbon of the blood with Oxygen in the Lungs produces the evolution of heat; the necessary warmth of the body is thus maintained and distributed, by means of the circulating blood, from the Lungs to every part. Besides this important function as expurgator of the blood, we have to carry off an incalculable quantity of waste animal matter and superfluous moisture, which, without our agency, would be productive of disease and pain.

3. How we accomplish all this we shall not stop to describe. There are books enough which will explain to your satisfaction the whole process, and which will prove to you some wonderful facts in regard to the tasks that we are put to. What will you say, for instance, when we tell you that the amount of blood sent to us, to refine and vitalize, at every pulsation of the heart, is about two ounces? Will you believe it when we tell you that, with every breath, we inhale about one pint of air; making eighteen pints of air inhaled every minute? Such is the fact; and a little ciphering will show you that, every twenty-four hours, we inhale sixty hogsheads of air, and give passage to thirty hogsheads of blood!

4. After this assertion (which you can easily verify), we hope you will listen to what we have to say with a little attention and respect. You need not be told that the act of breathing is essential to organic life. Exclusion of atmospheric air from the lungs for the space of three minutes will generally cause death. Breathing consists of two actions: inspiration, or drawing in the air; and expiration, or forcing out the air. Now, why is breathing essential to life? Simply because the blood could not be so purified as to be rendered fit to support life without being subjected to the action of the air continually pumped into our reservoirs by the act of respiration. The blood comes in from the heart of a purple color, and in a heterogeneous state, unfit for the nutrition of the animal body. We send it back to the heart,

purified and transmuted by the Oxygen of the air into a homogeneous fluid of a bright-red color."

5. But if the air we inhale is thus made to part with its Oxygen, has the air we exhale undergone no change in our service? Of course it has a very important change! You may easily test the fact. Put a piece of quill into the nōzle of a pair of bellows, cause the bellows to blow into a cup of lime-water, and you will find no change in the appearance of the latter; for through the bellows the same kind of air which we require to inhale is blown in. But put the quill into your mouth, and blow into the lime-water, and you will see it become turbid and white, and, if allowed to stand, a fine white powder will fall to the bottom. The reason is, the air which you have blown into the water has passed through your Lungs, and parted with its Oxygen, and its place has been supplied by another and a compound gas, known as Carbonic Acid.

6. We hope we are not growing tedious; but we here wish you to be distinctly impressed with the fact that the air which we take in is a very different article from that which we give out. The air we take in is a compound gas, of whose weight Nitrogen forms four-fifths and Oxygen one-fifth. The air we give out contains about eight per cent. more Carbonic Acid than it had when we inhaled it, and its Oxygen is diminished in the proportion necessary to form this acid, If the same air be respired over and over several times, all its Oxygen is consumed, and the air becomes loaded with Carbonic Acid gas.

7. Now, pray remember this: unmixed Carbonic Acid gas when inhaled is a deadly poison; and even when mixed with a large quantity of atmospheric air, it is pernicious to health in proportion to its amount beyond a certain quantity. Thrust a lighted candle into a jar full of it, and the flame will be extinguished. An ignorance of its poisonous quality, and of the importance of continuous fresh supplies of Oxygen, has often led to the destruction of life. In the year 1797, the master of a sinall vessel belonging to Southampton, in England, had seventy passengers collected in the hold during a storm. Thinking to make them more secure, he spread a tarpaulin over the hatches and battened it down. On opening the hold, all the passengers were found dead! The air being shut out, all the Oxygen had been consumed, and the deadly Carbonic Acid had been generated in its place. The master who had brought about this immense loss of life, through ignorance of the effects of foul air, became mad, and died soon after.

8. The same catastrophe was repeated, December 22d, 1848, on board the steamer Londonderry, from Sligo, bound for Amer

ica via Liverpool. Into a space about eighteen feet long by ten or twelve in width, one hundred and fifty human beings were packed. It was ventilated by only one opening, the com panion-way, as it is called; and, for fear that the water would get admission, this aperture was at length closed, and a tarpaulin nailed over it. In the darkness and heat and loathsomeness of their airless prison, the wretched inmates shrieked for aid; but the boisterousness of the storm was such that they could not make themselves heard by those on deck. When at length an opening was made, it was found that the floor was covered with dead bodies to the depth of some feet. Seventytwo men, women, and children, perished on this occasion, through the ignorance of the captain and mate of the facts that we have been endeavoring to impress upon you!

In

9. Perhaps you will cry out against this most culpable ignorance. Alas! every day we witness instances of similar heed-. lessness, which, if not so instantly fatal, do undoubtedly operate to undermine the health and shorten the lives of thousands. the sleeping-room, the parlor, the school-room, the church, and the hall of assembly, men, women, and children, are too often subjected to the inhalation of an atmosphere partially poisoned, the effect of which must unavoidably be mischievous in a greater or less degree. We have sometimes wished that air might become dyed of a different color after having been used, that those who live in a perpetual terror of fresh air might see the poisonous atmosphere to which they condemn themselves. It would seem as if some people were so in the habit of avoiding pure air, that if you were to shut them up in a bottle they would call out to you to put in the cork!

CLXX. THE COMPLAINT OF A PAIR OF LUNGS.

PART SECOND.

1. AHEM! It is our mistress's fault, and not ours, if we occasionally are obliged to stop in order to cough. We had almost forgotten our own private grievances in speaking of the general suffering to our fraternity resulting from an insufficient supply of pure air. We were born into what we may not improperly style "this breathing world" a very healthy and perfect pair of Lungs. But we had not been in it long, before the nurse to whom our young lady had been confided caused us great suffering by covering her with blankets and