As night drew on, and from the crest
Of wooded knolls that ridged the west,
The sun, a snow-blown traveler, sank
From sight beneath the smothering bank,
We piled with care our nightly stack
Of wood against the chimney-back,
The oaken log, green, huge, and thick,
And on its top the stout back-stick ;
The knotty forestick laid apart,
And filled between with curious art
The ragged brush; then, hovering near,
We watched the first red blaze appear,
Heard the sharp crackle, caught the gleam
On whitewashed wall and sagging beam,
Until the old, rude-furnished room
Burst, flower-like, into rosy bloom;
While radiant with a mimic flame
Outside the sparkling drift became,
And through the bare-boughed lilac-tree
Our own warm hearth seemed blazing free.
The crane and pendent trammels showed;
The Turks' heads on the andirons glowed;
While childish fancy, prompt to tell
The meaning of the miracle,

Whispered the old rhyme: "Under the tree,
When fire outdoors burns merrily,

There the witches are making tea.”

The moon above the eastern wood
Shone at its full; the hill-range stood
Transfigured in the silver flood,

Its blown snows flashing cold and keen,
Dead-white, save where some sharp ravine
Took shadow, or the somber green
Of hemlocks turned to pitchy black
Against the whiteness at their back.
For such a world and such a night
Most fitting that unwarming light,
Which only seemed, where'er it fell,
To make the coldness visible.

[Lines 1 to 154.

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES, M.D.

BORN AUG. 29, 1809, CAMBRIDGE, MASS.

Popular writer of prose and poetry.

Author of "Autocrat of the BreakfastTable," "Elsie Venner," and "The Guardian Angel." Poems in two volumes.

EXTRACT FROM POETRY: A METRICAL ESSAY.

SOME prouder Muse, when comes the hour at last,
May shake our hillsides with her bugle-blast:
Not ours the task. But, since the lyric dress
Relieves the statelier with its sprightliness,

Hear an old song, which some, perchance, have seen
In stale gazette, or cobwebbed magazine.
There was an hour when patriots dared profane
The mast that Britain strove to bow in vain;
And one who listened to the tale of shame,
Whose heart still answered to that sacred name,
Whose eye still followed o'er his country's tides
Thy glorious flag, our brave "Old Ironsides!"
From yon lone attic, on a summer's morn,

Thus mocked the spoilers with his schoolboy scorn:

Ay, tear her tattered ensign down!
Long has it waved on high;
And many an eye has danced to see
That banner in the sky.
Beneath it rung the battle-shout,

And burst the cannon's roar:

The meteor of the ocean-air

Shall sweep the clouds no more!

Her deck, once red with heroes' blood,
Where knelt the vanquished foe,
When winds were hurrying o'er the flood,
And waves were white below,
No more shall feel the victor's tread,
Or know the conquered knee:
The harpies of the shore shall pluck
The eagle of the sea!

Oh! better that her shattered hulk
Should sink beneath the wave:
Her thunders shook the mighty deep,
And there should be her grave.
Nail to the mast her holy flag;
Set every threadbare sail;

And give her to the god of storms,
The lightning and the gale!

That he had a Roman nose,
And his cheek was like a rose
In the snow.

But now his nose is thin,
And it rests upon his chin
Like a staff;

And a crook is in his back,
And a melancholy crack
In his laugh.

I know it is a sin

For me to sit and grin
At him here;

But the old three-cornered hat,
And the breeches, and all that,
Are so queer!

And, if I should live to be
The last leaf upon the tree
In the spring,

Let them smile, as I do now,
At the old forsaken bough
Where I cling.

EXTRACT FROM THE AUTOCRAT OF THE BREAKFAST-TABLE.

I was just going to say, when I was interrupted, that one of the many ways of classifying minds is under the heads of arithmetical and algebraical intellects. All economical and practical wisdom is an extension or variation of the following arithmetical formula: 2+2=4. Every philosophical proposition has the more general character of the expression a+b=c. We are mere operatives, empirics, and egotists, until we learn to think in letters instead of figures.

They all stared. There is a divinity-student lately come among us, to whom I commonly address remarks like the above, allowing him to take a certain share in the conversation, so far as assent or pertinent questions are involved. He abused his liberty on this occasion by presuming to say that Leibnitz had the same observation. "No, sir," I replied, "he has not. But he said a mighty good thing about mathematics, that sounds something like it; and you found it, not in the original, but quoted by Dr. Thomas Reid. I will tell the company what he did say, one of these days."

If I belong to a Society of Mutual Admiration? - I blush to say that I do not at this present moment. I once did, however. It was the first association to which I ever heard the

term applied, a body of scientific young men in a great foreign city who admired their teacher, and, to some extent, each other. Many of them deserved it: they have become famous since. It amuses me to hear the talk of one of those beings described by Thackeray

"Letters four do form his name'

about a social development which belongs to the very noblest stage of civilization. All generous companies of artists, authors, philanthropists, men of science, are, or ought to be, Societies of Mutual Admiration. A man of genius, or any kind of superiority, is not debarred from admiring the same quality in another, nor the other from returning his admiration. They may even associate together, and continue to think highly of each other. And so of a dozen such men, if any one place is fortunate enough to hold so many. The being referred to above assumes several false premises. First, That men of talent necessarily hate each other. Secondly, That intimate knowledge or habitual association destroys our admiration of persons whom we esteemed highly at a distance. Thirdly, That a circle of clever fellows, who meet together to dine and have a good time, have signed a constitutional compact to glorify themselves, and to put down him and the fraction of the human race not belonging to their number. Fourthly, That it is an outrage that he is not asked to join them.

Here the company laughed a good deal; and the old gentleman who sits opposite said, "That's it! that's it!"

I continued; for I was in the talking vein. As to clever people's hating each other, I think a little extra talent does sometimes make people jealous. They become irritated by perpetual attempts and failures, and it hurts their tempers and dispositions. Unpretending mediocrity is good, and genius is glorious; but a weak flavor of genius in an essentially common person is detestable. It spoils the grand neutrality of a commonplace character, as the rinsings of an unwashed wineglass spoil a draught of fair water. No wonder the poor fellow we spoke of, who always belongs to this class of slightly-flavored mediocrities, is puzzled and vexed by the strange sight of a dozen men of capacity working and playing together in harmony. He and his fellows are always fighting. With them, familiarity naturally breeds contempt. If they ever praise each other's bad drawings, or broken-winded novels, or spavined verses, nobody ever supposed it was from admiration it was simply a contract between themselves and a publisher or dealer.

If the Mutuals have really nothing among them worth admiring, that alters the question. But, if they are men with noble