Her modest and highly intelligent appearance, and the laudable object for which she toiled, secured friends and public patronage beyond her most sanguine hopes. We cannot better do her justice, in this connection, than by copying the following summary editorial:

"How few who may read this paragraph, would think it possible for them, entirely without means, to get up a book, transact all the business contracts and operations necessary, and then, without a single ray of light to guide their steps, go out personally to sell it, day after day, patiently ferreting out dark, lonely streets, and climbing winding stairs; thereby to secure food and raiment. Such enterprise is worthy of praise, and deserves the encouragement of every patron of honest industry. This looks to us like the ambition of Napoleon crossing the Alps, or gathering his scattered army after his discomfiture at Moscow.

The purpose of this blind lady is, to secure for herself "a little cottage and a little plat," which she may call her home. Her cottage must be built. Every book sold, piles one stone on its walls, and all who enjoy a good home, and who can look upon its dear and loved inmates, cannot better add to the zest of its enjoyments than by mingling with them the consciousness of having contributed to provide the same for one who is eminently qualified to enjoy and ornament domestic life, and upon whom has fallen this unparalleled succession of bereavements, thus lo

scribed in her own words: "I was in one short month a bride, a widow, and blind."

Such men as our late President Taylor, Mr. Clay, General Waddy Thompson, Senator Dawson, Mr Burt, General Greene, Rev. Dr. Nott, and Dr Turner of New York, and his excellency, Governor Floyd of Virginia, and many other distinguished individuals, both of the clergy and laity, together with the prin cipal editors of New York, Washington, Charleston. S. C., Boston, Salem, Portland, and other places, have lent their influence to this work; and, moreover, Mrs. DeKroyft brings with her letters from many of the most gifted ladies of our land, one of whom, from Washington, says: "That Mrs. DeKroyft is a lady of more than ordinary interest, we need say only to those who have not had the pleasure of listening to her graceful conversation, or reading one of her charming letters in ‘A Place in Thy Memory,' which we are happy to say, ornaments almost every drawing-room in Washington City. It is a book which may be read with profit by the most talented, as well as the most common reader. It occurs to us that this

book is really one of the most interesting and useful Gift Books for the season. It is no fiction from this flood' of literature that is now upon us, but a true, an interesting, and a peculiar phase of real life, that will do good wherever it is read and pondered. The book is embellished with an engraving of the author, and the New York Institution for the Blind."

We will not anticipate with further detail, the me

moirs of her life, with which we hope she will at some time favor the public. A true history of her trials and triumphs, in her own magic style, would stimulate forcibly those under similar privations, to shake off the fetters of dependence, and grapple successfully with the difficulties of their situation.

The following is an example of her composition, which, in point of majesty and sublimity of thought, we think, is seldom excelled in the English language:

PRAYER TO LIGHT.

Oh, holy light! thou art old as the look of God, and eternal as his breath. The angels were rocked in thy lap, and their infant smiles were brightened by thee. Creation is in thy memory; by thy torch the throne of Jehovah was set, and thy hand burnished the myriad stars that glitter in his crown. Worlds, new from IIis omnipotent hand, were sprinkled with beams from thy baptismal font. At thy golden urn, pale Luna comes to fill her silver horn, and Saturn bathes his sky-girt rings; Jupiter lights his waning moons, and Venus dips her queenly robes anew. Thy fountains are shoreless as the ocean of heavenly love; thy center is everywhere, and thy boundary no power has marked. Thy beams gild the illimitable fields of space, and gladden the farthest verge of the universe. The glories of the seventh heaven are open to thy gaze, and thy glare is felt in

the woes of lowest Erebus. The sealed books of heaven by thee are read, and thine eye, like the Infinite, can pierce the dark vail of the future, and glance backward through the mystic cycles of the past. Thy touch gives the lily its whiteness, the rose its tint, and thy kindling ray makes the diamond's light; thy beams are mighty as the power that binds the spheres; thou canst change the sleety winds to soothing zephyrs, and thou canst melt the icy mountains of the poles to gentle rains and dewy vapors. The granite rocks of the hills are upturned by thee, volcanoes burst, islands sink and rise, rivers roll, and oceans swell at thy look of command. And oh, thou monarch of the skies, bend now thy bow of millioned arrows, and pierce, if thou canst, this darkness that thrice twelve moons has bound me. Burst now thine emerald gates, O morn, and let thy dawning come. My eyes roll in vain to find thee, and my soul is weary of this interminable gloom. My heart is but the tomb of blighted hopes, and all the misery of feelings unemployed, has settled on me. I am misfortune's child, and sorrow long since marked me for her own.

MISS FRANCES BROWN.

Though this fair world so radiant with light,
To thee, lay shrouded in perpetual night;
Creative Genius, conscious of her power,

Framed thee a world with mountain, tree and flower,
And glassy lake, reflecting from its breast

The mirrored forms that there in beauty rest.
And e'en the muse, obedient to thy call,
Kindled thy fancy, and inspired thy soul
To rapturous song, of love and story old,

Of memories faded, and of hearts grown cold

FOR the particulars of the life of Miss Brown, we are chiefly indebted to the celebrated Dr. Kitto, author of "The Lost Senses." She was born, it appears, in 1816, at Stranolar, in the county of Donegal. There is little known of her parents, except that her father was postmaster of the village. When but eighteen months old, she lost her sight by the smallpox. And in consequence of this misfortune, her early education, like that of most blind children, was neglected. It is commonly supposed, that blind persons can derive no benefit from the ordinary methods of instruction used at common schools. This we think is a mistaken notion. It is true, a blind child cannot perform an example in arithmetic on a common slate, er demonstrate a geometrical figure drawn upon the