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LINES TO A CHRYSALIS.

MUSING long I asked me this,
Chrysalis,

Lying helpless in my path,
Obvious to mortal scath
From a careless passer by,
What thy life may signify?
Why, from hope and joy apart,
Thus thou art?

Nature surely did amiss,
Chrysalis,
When she lavish'd fins and wings
Nerved with nicest moving-springs,
On the mote and madripore,
Wherewithal to swim or soar;
And dispensed so niggardly
Unto thee.

E'en the very worm may kiss,
Chrysalis,

Roses on their topmost stems
Blazon'd with their dewy gems,
And may rock him to and fro
As the zephyrs softly blow;
Whilst thou lyest dark and cold
On the mould.

Quoth the Chrysalis, Sir Bard,
Not so hard

Is my rounded destiny
In the great Economy:
Nay, by humble reason view'd,
There is much for gratitude
In the shaping and upshot

Of my lot.

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Soul of man in crypt of clay! Bide the day When thy latent wings shall be Plumed for immortality,

And with transport marvellous Cleave their dark sarcophagus, O'er Elysian fields to soar Evermore!

THE HOME VALENTINE.

STILL fond and true, though wedded long
The bard, at eve retired,
Sat smiling o'er the annual song

His home's dear Muse inspired:
And as he traced her virtues now

With all love's vernal glow,
A gray hair from his bended brow,
Like faded leaf from autumn bough,

Fell to the page below.

He paused, and with a mournful mien
The sad memento raised,
And long upon its silvery sheen

In pensive silence gazed:
And if a sigh escaped him then,

It were not strange to say;
For fancy's favourites are but men;
And who e'er felt the stoic when

First conscious of decay?

Just then a soft cheek press'd his own

With beauty's fondest tear,
And sweet words breathed in sweeter tone
Thus murmur'd in his ear:
Ah, sigh not, love to mark the trace

Of time's unsparing wand!
It was not manhood's outward grace,
No charm of faultless form or face,
That won my heart and hand.
Lo! dearest, mid these matron locks,
Twin-fated with thine own,
A dawn of silvery lustre mocks

The midnight they have known:
But time to blighted cheek and tress
May all his snows impart;
Yet shalt thou feel in my caress
No chill of waning tenderness,
No winter of the heart!

Forgive me, dearest Beatrice!
The grateful bard replied,
As nearer and with tenderer kiss
He pressed her to his side:
Forgive the momentary tear
To manhood's faded prime;
I should have felt, hadst thou been near,
Our hearts indeed have nought to fear
From all the frosts of time!

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TO MY MOTHER.

Mr mother!-Manhood's anxious brow
And sterner cares have long been mine;
Yet turn I to thee fondly now,

As when upon thy bosom's shrine
My infant griefs were gently hush'd to rest,

And thy low-whisper'd prayers my slumber bless'd.

I never call that gentle name,

My mother! but I am again

E'en as a child; the very same
That prattled at thy knee; and fain
Would I forget, in momentary joy,

That I no more can be thy happy boy ;-
The artless boy, to whom thy smile

Was sunshine, and thy frown sad night,
(Though rare that frown, and brief the while
It veil'd from me thy loving light;)
For well-conn'd task, ambition's highest bliss,
To win from thine approving lips a kiss.
I've loved through foreign lands to roam,
And gazed o'er many a classic scene;
Yet would the thought of that dear home,
Which once was ours, oft intervene,
And bid me close again my weary eye

To think of thee, and those sweet days gone by.

That pleasant home of fruits and flowers,
Where, by the Hudson's verdant side
My sisters wove their jasmine bowers,
And he, we loved, at eventide

Would hastening come from distant toil to bless
Thine, and his children's radiant happiness.

Alas, the change! the rattling car

On flint-paved streets profanes the spot,
Where o'er the sod, we sow'd the Star
Of Bethlehem, and Forget-me-not.
Oh, wo to Mammon's desolating reign!
We ne'er shall find on earth a home again!

I've pored o'er many a yellow page
Of ancient wisdom, and have won,
Perchance, a scholar's name-but sage
Or bard have never taught thy son
Lessons so dear, so fraught with holy truth,
As those his mother's faith shed on his youth.

If, by the Saviour's grace made meet,
My GoD will own my life and love,

Methinks, when singing at His feet,

Amid the ransom'd throng above,

Thy name upon my glowing lips shall be,
And I will bless that grace for heaven and thee.
For thee and heaven; for thou didst tread

The way that leads me heavenward, and
My often wayward footsteps led

In the same path with patient hand; And when I wander'd far, thy earnest call Restored my soul from sin's deceitful thrall. I have been bless'd with other ties,

Fond ties and true, yet never deem That I the less thy fondness prize;

No, mother! in my warmest dream

Of answer'd passion, through this heart of mine
One chord will vibrate to no name but thine.
Mother! thy name is widow-well

I know no love of mine can fill
The waste place of thy heart, or dwell
Within one sacred recess: still
Lean on the faithful bosom of thy son,
My parent, thou art mine, my only one!

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GEORGE W. BETHUNE.

Are come from heaven to claim your brotherhood
With mortal brother, struggling in the strife
And chains, which once were yours in this sad life.

Ye hover o'er the page

Ye traced in ancient days with glorious thought
For many a distant age;

Ye love to watch the inspiration caught,
From your sublime examples, and so cheer
The fainting student to your high career.

Ye come to nerve the soul

like him who near the ATONER stood, when HE, Trembling, saw round him roll

The wrathful potents of Gethsemane,
With courage strong: the promise ye have known
And proved, rapt for me from the Eternal throne.

Still keep! O, keep me near you,
Compass me round with your immortal wings:
Still let my glad soul hear you
Striking your triumphs from your golden strings,
Until with you I mount, and join the song,
An angel, like you, 'mid the white-robed throng.

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O Night,

Bless them in dreams with a deep hush'd delight.

Yet must they wake again,

Wake soon to all the bitterness of life,
The pang of sorrow, the temptation strife,
Aye, to the conscience-pain-
O Night,

Canst thou not take with them a longer flight?

Canst thou not bear them far

E'en now all innocent-before they know
The taint of sin, its consequence of wo,
The world's distracting jar,
O Night,

To some ethereal, holier, happier height?

Canst thou not bear them up

Through starlit skies, far from this planet dim
And sorrowful, e'en while they sleep, to Him
Who drank for us the cup,
O Night,

The cup of wrath for hearts in faith contrite?

To Him, for them who slept

A babe all lowly on His mother's knee,
And from that hour to cross-crown'd Calvary,

In all our sorrows wept,

O Night,

[light.

That on our souls might dawn Heaven's cheering

So, lay their little heads

Close to that human breast, with love divine Deep beating, while his arms immortal twine

Around them as he sheds,

O Night,

[might.

On them a brother's grace of God's own boundless

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AFAR from thee! the morning breaks,
But morning brings no joy to me;
Alas! my spirit only wakes

To know I am afar from thee.
In dreams I saw thy blessed face,

And thou wert nestled on my breast;
In dreams I felt thy fond embrace,

And to mine own thy heart was press'd
Afar from thee! 'tis solitude!

Though smiling crowds around me be,
The kind, the beautiful, the good,
For I can only think of thee;
Of thee, the kindest, loveliest, best,
My earliest and my only one!
Without thee I am all unbless'd,
And wholly bless'd with thee alone.
Afar from thee! the words of praise

My listless car unheeded greet;
What sweetest seem'd, in better days,
Without thee seems no longer sweet.
The dearest joy fame can bestow

Is in thy moisten'd eye to see,
And in thy cheek's unusual glow,
Thou deem'st me not unworthy thee.
Afar from thee! the night is come,

But slumbers from my pillow flee;
Oh, who can rest so far from home?
And my heart's home is, love, with thee.
I kneel me down in silent prayer,
And then I know that thou art nigh:
For Gon, who seeth everywhere,
Bends on us both his watchful eye.
Together, in his loved embrace,

No distance can our hearts divide;
Forgotten quite the mediate space,
I kneel thy kneeling form beside.
My tranquil frame then sinks to sleep,
But soars the spirit far and free;
Oh, welcome be night's slumbers deep,
For then, sweet love, I am with thee.

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CHARLES FENNO HOFFMAN.

[Born, 1806.]

THE author of "Greyslaer," " Wild Scenes in the Forest and the Prairie," etc., is a brother of the Honourable OGDEN HOFFMAN, and a son of the late eminent lawyer of the same name.* He is the child of a second marriage. His maternal grandfather was JOHN FENNO, of Philadelphia, one of the ablest political writers of the old Fedeeral party, during the administration of WASHINGTox. The family, which is a numerous one in the state of New York, planted themselves, at an early day, in the valley of the Hudson, as appears from the Dutch records of PETER STUYVESANT'S storied reign.

Mr. HOFFMAN was born in New York, in the year 1806. He was sent to a Latin grammarschool in that city, when six years old, from which, at the age of nine, he was transferred to the Poughkeepsie academy, a seminary upon the Hudson, about eighty miles from New York, which at that time enjoyed great reputation. The harsh treatment he received here induced him to run away, and his father, finding that he had not improved under a course of severity, did not insist upon his return, but placed him under the care of an accomplished Scottish gentleman in one of the rural villages of New Jersey. During a visit home from this place, and when about twelve years of age, he met with an injury which involved the necessity of the immediate amputation of the right leg, above the knee. The painful circumstances are minutely detailed in the New York Evening Post," of the twenty-fifth of October, 1817, from which it appears, that while, with other lads, attempting the dangerous feat of leaping aboard a steamer as she passed a pier, under full way, he was caught between the vessel and the wharf. The steamer swept by, and left him clinging by his hands to the pier, crushed in a manner too frightful for description. This deprivation, instead of acting as a disqualification for the manly sports of youth, and thus turning the subject of it into a retired student, seems rather to have given young HOFFMAN an especial ambition to excel in swimming, riding, etc., to the still further neglect of perhaps more useful acquire

ments.

66

When fifteen years old, he entered Columbia College, and here, as at preparatory schools, was noted rather for success in gymnastic exercises

Judge HOFFMAN was, in early life, one of the most distinguished advocates at the American bar. He won his first cause in New Jersey at the age of seventeen; the illness of counsel or the indulgence of the court giving him the opportunity to speak. At twenty-one he suc ceeded his father as representative, from New York, in the state legislature. At twenty-six he filled the office of attorney-general; and thenceforth the still youthful pleader was often the successful competitor of HAMILTON, BURR, PINKNEY, and other professional giants, for the highest honours of the legal forum.

than in those of a more intellectual character. His reputation, judging from his low position in his class, contrasted with the honours that were awarded him by the college-societies at their anniversary exhibitions, was greater with the students than with the faculty, though the honorary degree of Master of Arts, conferred upon him under peculiarly gratifying circumstances, after leaving the institution in his third or junior year, without having graduated, clearly implies that he was still a favourite with his alma mater.*

Immediately after leaving college-being then eighteen years old--he commenced the study of the law with the Honourable HARMANUS BLEECKER, of Albany, now Charge d'Affaires of the United States at the Hague. When twenty-one, he was admitted to the bar, and in the succeeding three years he practised in the courts of the city of New York. During this period he wrote anonymously for the New York American--having made his first essay as a writer for the gazettes while in Albany--and I believe finally became associated with Mr. CHARLES KING in the editorship of that paper. Certainly he gave up the legal profession, for the successful prosecution of which he appears to have been unfitted by his love of books, society, and the rod and gun. His feelings at this period are described in some rhymes, entitled "Forest Musings," from which the following stanzas are quoted, to show the fine relish for forest-life and scenery which has thrown a peculiar charm around every production from his pen :-

The hunt is up

The merry woodland shout,
That rung these echoing glades about
An hour agone,

Hath swept beyond the eastern hills,
Where, pale and lone,

The moon her mystic circle fills;

A while across the setting sun's broad disc
The dusky larch,

As if to pierce the blue o'erhanging arch, Lifts its tall obelisk.

And now from thicket dark,

Where, by the mist-wreathed river, The fire-fly's spark

Will fitful quiver,

And bubbles round the lily's cup
From lurking trout come coursing up,
The doe hath led her fawn to drink;

While, scared by step so near,
Uprising from the sedgy brink
The lonely bittern's cry will sink
Upon the startled ear.

And thus upon my dreaming youth,

When boyhood's gambols pleased no more,
And young Romance, in guise of Truth,
Usurp'd the heart all theirs before;

At the first semi-centennial anniversary of the incorporation of Columbia College, the honorary degree Master of Arts was conferred upon FITZ-GREENE HALLECK, WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT, and CHARLES FENNO HOFFMAN.

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So eloquent!

Mocking the varied skill that's blent

In art's most gorgeous piles

No more can soothe my soul to sleep
Than they can awe the sounds that sweep
To hunter's horn and merriment

Their verdant passes through,
When fresh the dun-deer leaves his scent
Upon the morning dew.

The game's afoot!-and let the chase
Lead on, whate'er my destiny-
Though fate her funeral drum may brace
Full soon for me!

And wave death's pageant o'er me-
Yet now the new and untried world
Like maiden banner first unfurl'd,

Is glancing bright before me!

The quarry soars! and mine is now the sky,
Where, "at what bird I please, my hawk shall fly!"
Yet something whispers through the wood
A voice like that perchance

Which taught the haunter of EGERIA's grove
To tame the Roman's dominating mood

And lower, for awhile, his conquering lance
Before the images of Law and Love-
Some mystic voice that ever since hath dwelt
Along with Echo in her dim retreat,

A voice whose influence all, at times, have felt
By wood, or glen, or where on silver strand
The clasping waves of Ocean's belt

Do clashing meet

Around the land:

It whispers me that soon-too soon
The pulses which now beat so high
Impatient with the world to cope
Will, like the hues of autumn sky,
Be changed and fallen ere life's noon
Should tame its morning hope.
It tells me not of heart betray'd
Of health impair'd,

Of fruitless toil,

And ills alike by thousands shared,
Of which each year some link is made
To add to "mortal coil:"

And yet its strange prophetic tone

So faintly murmurs to my soul

The fate to be my own,

That all of these may be

Reserved for me

Ere manhood's early years can o'er me roll.

Yet why,

While Hope so jocund singeth

And with her plumes the gray-beard's arrow wingeth,
Should I

Think only of the barb it bringeth?

Though every dream deceive

That to my youth is dearest,

Until my heart they leave

Like forest leaf when searest

Yet still, mid forest leaves,

Where now

Its tissue thus my idle fancy weaves,

Still with heart new-blossoming

While leaves, and buds, and wild flowers spring,

At Nature's shrine I'll bow;

Nor seek in vain that truth in her
She keeps for her idolater.

From that period Mr. HOFFMAN devoted his attention almost constantly to literature. While connected with the "American," he published a series of brilliant articles in that paper, under the signature of a star (*), which attracted much a tention. In 1833, for the benefit of his health, he left New York on a travelling tour for the far west," and his letters, written during his absence, were also first published in that popular journal. They were afterward included in his "Winter in the West," of which the first impression appeared in New York, in 1834, and the second, soon after, in London. This work has passed through many editions, and it will continue to be popular so long as graphic descriptions of scenery and character, and richness and purity of style, are admired. His next work, entitled "Wild Scenes in the Forest and the Prairie," was first printed in 1837, and. like its predecessor, it contains admirable pictures of scenery, inwoven with legends of the western country, and descriptive poetry. This was followed by a romance, entitled "Greyslaer," founded upon the famous criminal trial of BEAU CHAMP, for the murder of Colonel SHARPE, the Solicitor-General of Kentucky,-the particulars of which, softened away in the novel, are minutely detailed in the appendix to his « Winter in the! West." "Greyslaer" was a successful noveltwo editions having appeared in the author's native city, one in Philadelphia, and a fourth in London, in the same year. It placed him in the front rank

many

it, with

of American novelists. He describes remarkable felicity, American forest-life, and savage warfare, and gives a truer idea of the border contests of the Revolution than any formal his tory of the period that has been published.

The Knickerbocker magazine was first issued under the editorial auspices of Mr. HOFFMAN. He subsequently became the proprietor of the American Monthly Magazine, (one of the ablest literary periodicals ever published in this country.) and during the long term of which he was the chief editor of this journal, he also, for one year, conducted the New York Mirror, for its proprietor, and wrote a series of zealous papers in favour of international copyright, for the New Yorker, the

Corsair, and other journals.

Mr. HOFFMAN published in 1843 « The Vigil of Faith, a Legend of the Andirondack Mountains, and other Poems;" in 1844, "The Echo, or Borrowed Notes for Home Circulation;" and in 1848, a more complete collection of his various lyrical compo sitions, under the title of "Love's Calendar."

When the first edition of "The Poets and Poetry of America" appeared there had been printed no volume of Mr. HOFFMAN'S songs, and few except his intimate friends knew what he had written. He was more largely quoted by me because it was not then probable that his pieces would be accessible in another form. In a reviewal of my book in the London "Foreign Quarterly Review" it was remarked that "American poetry is little better than a far off echo of the father-land," and Mr. HOFFMAN was particularly attacked as a pla giarist, much stress being laid upon "the magni

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