- occupy me for the rest of my days. In consequence of this fine scheme, every morning after breakfast, which we all took in company, I used to go with a magnifying-glass in my hand, and my "Systema Natura" under my arm, to visit some district of the island. I had divided it for that purpose into small squares, meaning to go through them one after another in each season of the year. At the end of two or three hours I used to return laden with an ample harvest, a provision for amusing myself after dinner indoors, in case of rain. I spent the rest of the morning in going with the steward, his wife, and Theresa, to see the laborers and the harvesting, and I generally set to work along with them: many a time when people from Berne came to see me they found me perched on a high tree, with a bag fastened round my waist; I kept filling it with fruit, and then let it down to the ground with a rope. The exercise I had taken in the morning, and the good-humor that always comes from exercise, made the repose of dinner vastly pleasant to me. But if dinner was kept up too long, and fine weather invited me forth, I could not wait; but was speedily off to throw myself all alone into a boat, which, when the water was smooth enough, I used to pull out to the middle of the lake. There, stretched at full length in the boat's bottom, with my eyes turned up to the sky, I let myself float slowly hither and thither as the water listed, sometimes for hours. together; plunged in a thousand confused delicious musings, which, though they had no fixed nor constant object, were not the less on that account a hundred times dearer to me than all that I had found sweetest in what they call the pleasures of life. Often warned by the going down of the sun that it was time to return, I found myself so far from the island that I was forced to row with all my might to get in before it was pitch dark. At other times, instead of losing myself in the midst of the waters, I had a fancy to coast along the green shores of the island, where the clear waters and cool shadows tempted me to bathe. But one of my most frequent expeditions was from the larger island to the less: there I disembarked and spent my afternoon, sometimes in mimic rambles among wild elders, persicaries, willows, and shrubs of every species; sometimes settling myself on the top of a sandy knoll, covered with turf, wild thyme, flowers, even sainfoin and trefoil that had most likely been sown there in old days, making excellent quarters for rabbits. They might multiply in peace without either fearing anything or harming anything. I spoke of this to the steward. He at once had male and female rabbits brought from Neuchâtel, and we went in high state- his wife, one of his The sisters, Theresa, and I to settle them in the little islet. foundation of our colony was a feast-day. The pilot of the Argonauts was not prouder than I, as I bore my company and the rabbits in triumph from our island to the smaller one. When the lake was too rough for me to sail, I spent my afternoon in going up and down the island, gathering plants to right and left; seating myself now in smiling lonely nooks to dream at my ease, now on little terraces and knolls, to follow with my eyes the superb and ravishing prospect of the lake and its shores, crowned on one side by the neighboring hills, and on the other melting into rich and fertile plains up to the feet of the pale-blue mountains on their far-off edge. As evening drew on, I used to come down from the high ground, and sit on the beach at the water's brink in some hidden sheltering-place. There the murmur of the waves and their agitation charmed all my senses, and drove every other movement away from my soul: they plunged it into delicious dreamings, in which I was often surprised by night. The flux and reflux of the water, its ceaseless stir, swelling and falling at intervals, striking on ear and sight, made up for the internal movements which my musings extinguished; they were enough to give me delight in mere existence, without taking any trouble of thinking. From time to time arose some passing thought of the instability of the things of this world, of which the face of the waters offered an image: but such light impressions were swiftly effaced in the uniformity of the ceaseless motion, which rocked me as in a cradle; it held me with such fascination that even when called at the hour and by the signal appointed, I could not tear myself away without summoning all my force. After supper, when the evening was fine, we used to go all together for a saunter on the terrace, to breathe the freshness of the air from the lake. We sat down in the arbor, - laughing, chatting, or singing some old song, and then we went home to bed, well pleased with the day, and only craving another that should be exactly like it on the morrow. . . All is a continual flux upon the earth. Nothing in it keeps a form constant and determinate; our affections-fastening on external things-necessarily change and pass just as they do. Ever in front of us or behind us, they recall the past that is gone, or anticipate a future that in many a case is destined never to be. There is nothing solid to which the heart can fix itself. Here we have little more than a pleasure that comes and passes away; as for the happiness that endures, I cannot tell if it be so'much as known among men. There is hardly in the midst of our liveliest delights a single instant when the heart could tell us with real truth, "I would this instant might last forever." And how can we give the name of happiness to a fleeting state that all the time leaves the heart unquiet and void, — that makes us regret something gone, or still long for something to come? FRIEDRICH RÜCKERT. RÜCKERT, FRIEDRICH, a distinguished German poet and orientalist, born at Schweinfurt, May 16, 1788; died at Neuses, near Coburg, January 31, 1866. He was educated at the University of Jena, edited the "Morgenblatt" in Stuttgart from 1815 to 1817, and in 1826 was appointed Professor of Oriental Languages in the University of Erlangen, which post he held until 1841, when he was called to the University of Berlin. He frequently wrote under the pen-name of Freimund Raimar. His works include translations and original poems. They are "Liebesfrühling" (1822); "Die Weisheit der Brahmanen," a didactic poem (1836-39); "Die Verwandlungen des Abu Seid von Sarug, oder die Makamen des Hariri" (1826); “Nal und Damajanti," from the "Mahábhárata" (1828); "Rostem und Suhrab," from Firdausi's "Shah-Nameh;" and several posthumous works, including one on the Coptic language 1875. He published many translations from the Arabic, and wrote many original poems dealing with Oriental subjects; among them being "Oriental Roses" (1822); "Songs and Legends of the Orient" (1837); "Rostem and Suhrab: A Heroic Tale" (1838); and "Brahman Tales" (1839). The most elaborate of all his works is "The Wisdom of the Brahmans." His life has been written by Fortlage (1867), Beyer (1868), Boxberger (1878), Konrad Fischer (1889), and F. Reuter (1891). GREEDINESS PUNISHED. It was the cloister Grabow, in the land of Usédom; Along the shore came swimming, to give the monks good cheer Who dwelt within the cloister, two fishes every year: They might have been contented! Two sturgeons two great fat ones and then this law was set, The other swam away then until next year came round, So then again they caught one, and served him in the dish, They might have been contented! One year, the time appointed two such great fishes brought, They caught them both together, but every greedy wight This was the least of sorrows: hear how the cup ran o'er ! So long had God supplied them of his free grace alone, THE PATRIOT'S LAMENT. "WHAT forgest, smith ?"—"We 're forging chains; ay, chains!". "Alas! to chains yourselves degraded are!"— "What plowest, farmer?". "Fields their fruit must bear." 66 "Yes, seed for foes: the burr for thee remains!" "What aim'st at, sportsman ? "Yonder stag, so fat." "Boys." "What art thou rocking, sleepless mother? "What art thou writing, poet?" "Words of flame: I blame them not, who with the foreign steel |