carefully and with much pleasure, on account both of the characters and the moral. I have no interest with the people of the play-house, else I would gladly recommend it to them. I send you a small present, in such gold as will not give you trouble to change, for I much pity your loss of sight, which, if it had pleased God to let you enjoy, your other talents might have been your honest support, and had eased you of your present confinement.

"I am, sir, your well-wishing friend,

"and humble servant,

"JONATHAN SWIFT

"Deanery House, Christmasday, 1737."

In the year 1746, he received a sum of money for performing the part of Tiresias, the blind prophet, in "Edipus," which was acted for his benefit at Drury Lane theater. He afterward settled at Kilkenny, where he was for some time connected with a Latin school. Clancy was the author of three dramatic pieces, and also of a Latin poem, called "Templum Veneris, sive Amorum Rhapsodiæ." From the following fragment, found among the papers of Mrs. Pilkington, we conclude the stream which most embittered our author's life did not spring from want of sight, but from the climax of domestic misery — a scolding wife.

"Hapless Clancy! grieve no more,

Socrates was plagued before;

Though o'ercast, thy visual ray

Meets no more the light of day,

Yet even here is comfort had,
Good prevailing over bad.

Now thou canst no more behold

The grim aspect of thy scold;

Oh! what raptures wouldst thou find,
Wert thou deaf as well as blind."

A German, named JOHN PHEFFEL, a native of Colmar, who lost his sight in youth, wrote several volumes of poetry, consisting chiefly of fables, which were published in 1791. He also established in his native town a military school, to which youths of the best families in Germany were sent to be educated. He died in 1809, in the seventy-third year of his age.

Miss ANNA WILLIAMS, who came to London in 1730, with her father, a Welch surgeon, lost her sight from cataract, in the thirty-fourth year of her age. This disheartening calamity did not strip life of all its attractions, nor crush every hope of future usefulness, but seemed rather to give new zest to intellectual pursuits. Her world was now one of thought, and every bright creation of fancy seemed more glorious in contrast with the dark world without. In 1746, after six years of blindness, she published a translation from the French of Le Bleterie's "Life of the Emperor Julian," and twenty years after she appeared again as an authoress, of a volume entitled, "Miscellanies in Prose and Verse." Her fine literary attainments recommended her to the notice of Dr. Johnson, in whose house she lived for several years, and died in 1783, at the age of seventy-seven.

We have also before us a miscellaneous collection

of prose and verse, yet in manuscript, from the pen of O. Hewitt, late deceased, who was an intimate friend and classmate of the present writers.

'We thank thee, Lord, that in each stricken heart,
The radiant star of hope doth brightly shine;
And while we weep that thus we early part,
We bless the chast'ning hand, for it is thine;
We know thy mercy, Lord―thy righteous ways,
And while we mourn, we praise."

Hewitt was born 1827, in Tioga county, New York, and lost his sight in infancy. He entered the Institution for the Blind at New York in 1839, and, after a term of six years, graduated with the highest honors of that institute. He died, from pulmonary consumption, June 10th, 1852, in the twenty-fifth year of his age. We cannot but feel a deep regret for his early death, in common with the numerous and admiring friends which his kindness, generosity, and promising genius had endeared to him. But from the deep rooted and unaffected piety that characterized his life, we are encouraged to hope that his immortal spirit has winged its flight to realms of unclouded day. "And there shall be no night there; and they need no candle, neither light of the sun; for the Lord God giveth them light: and they shall reign for ever and ever." His manuscripts, from which we subjoin the following short poem, as a specimen of the author's style, have fallen into the hands of a relative, who appreciates the value, and they will, it is hoped, ere long find thei

way to the press.

REFLECTIONS ON VISITING THE RESIDENCE OF A DECEASED FRIEND.

I entered that lone dwelling, all was still;
No sound of joy or mirth was heard along
Those now deserted halls, but silence deep
Reigned there, in all its solem ity.

But each familiar thing, so dear to me
In other days, remains unchanged by time;
Like living sentinels they ever stand

To speak to me of the departed dead.

But where is she, whose tones of gladness oft
Echoed so joyously through these lone walls
Gone, never to return, or cheer again

The hearts that sigh in vain for scenes long fle
And must it be, that other feet shall tread
The spot still sacred to her memory?

Be, as she oft has been, the pride and joy
Of those that gather round the social board?
No, though ye revel still in smiles, and though
In mirth and joy the livelong night may pass,
Sad thoughts of other days will sometimes come,
To cast a shadow o'er your brightest joys.

"Tis strange, though true, those we have held most dea
Wither and die, touched by the icy hand

Of dh; and o'er their slow but sure decay
Grieves if all that we most prize on earth
With that loved form had perished in an hour:
And yet, we soon forget that they have been,
Forget that they to us were ever dear;
That yesterday they mingled in the dance,
To-day are slumbering cold in death's embrace.
Again I entered that once loved abode;
But other forms and other scenes were there,
And I, of all that vast assembled crowd,
Am now a stranger where was once my home.
Oh, it is sad, that time should ever bring
Such fearful changes to so fair a spot-

That one who once was gladly welcomed there
Should stand alone by all forgotten now.

But I can bear it, though the sacred past
Be full of sadness-yet 'tis sweet to know
That those I loved have slumbered in the grave,
And buried friendship in oblivion deep,

Ere yet its holy flame had ceased to burn

Or dimmed its brightness by the flight of years.

In arranging these characters, we have usually treated them in order of time; but after the completion of this article, we found, on looking over our list of authors, that we had omitted the name of EDWARD RUSHTON, whose abilities as a writer justly entitle him to a place among the poets, as the extract subjoined will show.

He was a native of Liverpool, and lost his sight in 1774, in his nineteenth year, while on a slaving voy age to the coast of Africa. It is, however, due to his memory to record, that when he beheld the horrors of this disgraceful traffic, he expressed his sentiments in very strong and pointed language, with the boldness and integrity which characterized his every action; and though in a subordinate situation, he went so far that it was thought necessary to threaten him with the irons if he did not desist.

The first occupation worthy of note in which he en gaged after his return to England, was the editing of a newspaper called the "Herald." But finding his views too liberal and magnanimous for the times, and the engagement not very lucrative, he exchanged it for that of a bookseller, a branch of business more