to seed-with both hands in his pockets, and elbows out. All he learnt abroad was to smoke the German pipe, eat German sausages, and blow the German flute-poor wretch!to talk about Goethe, Schiller, Jean Paul Richter, and Lessing, for ever and ever, and always in such a way as to satisfy you that he knows nothing of them, nor of their worksto forget all the English he ever knew-and guzzle strong beer. beautiful contrivances on earth for concealing the truth, when people "eat dirt." You see how fat he is growing, and how sleepy he looks. Well, that is all owing to the simple fact, that while his opium is real, his tobacco is all make-believe. In the first place, the bowl is crammed with sweet-scented herbs; then there is a little dust of tobacco-a little bright yellowish dust only; and then a little good opium; and then the pipe is so contrived that all the smoke passes through a porcelain or silver cup, filled with rose water, and a long flexible tube, so as to reach the mouth not like a current of hot steam, or filthy smoke, parching the throat, spoiling the teeth, and scenting a fellow inside and out, until, as you see every day, well-bred people are obliged to turn away, or clap their handkerchiefs to their noses, while he is entertaining them after the pleasantest fashion, as he thinks; but like the summer south wind, moist, and cool, and fragrant, breathing o'er banks of violets." And now, which of all these five are the barba One step farther, if you please; and if you would lose sight for a while of the loathsomeness and beastliness of smoking, and be persuaded into a belief that, by possibility, the practice might be endured, with some strange and luxurious qualifications, whereby tobacco may become a fragrant and generous herb, and the pipe an alembic for distilling atta of roses, lift up your eyes to the East, and study the fashion of the hookah, and compare it with the German, or English, or American pipeif you dare. The Greek soldier of rank has rather a delicate taste; and, like the German, uses a pipe so contrived, that he breathes onlyrians, hey? the distant aroma of the herbs mixed with the Here endeth the first lesson. Hereafter we tobacco; and for that high privilege, he is may be tempted to try another for the encouready to lay down his life at any time. Stop ragement of chewers, who instead of crawling a moment! and you shall have a sketch of him about the inhabited places of earth, and crying, by our friend here, luxuriating in midsummer," Unclean! unclean!" occupy the most crowded with his purple velvet cap and heavy golden of our thoroughfares, without shame or comtassel, and richly embroidered jacket, and mag-punction, or any show of decency. Perhaps, nificent sash, and loose white trousers, taking an hour by the sea-side-there!—that's hecouldn't you swear to the likeness? One touch more-and "one touch of nature makes the whole world kin❞—just to show you the difference between that supple and crafty Greek and his oriental neighbour, in this one particular, the use of tobacco. That long Turkish pipe, springing so gracefully and serpent-like from the mouth of the fat lazy fellow you see at the top of our sketch, lolling cross-legged on a pile of sumptuous cushions and pillows of striped silk, is one of the most if they were to glance at the white floors and richly carpeted saloons they have spoiled, in cars, steamboats, hotels, and private habitations, they might understand what M. G. Lewis really meant, when he spoke of the venom that dropped continually from the jaws of that serpent, coiled about the handle of a door to a forbidden place,- -a smoking-room perhaps why the plague don't they have chawing-rooms? have they no sense of decency left? saying,— "And this juice of hell, wherever it fell, CHANT OF THE DREAMS. BY BAYARD TAYLOR. WHEN the Night's mid-silence fell soft and deep, A Fate unbolted the ivory bars, And the curtains that hung in a stirless fold The drowsy fountains ceased their play And a glimmering film, that, floating, spread Like gossamer barges, loitering free FIRST DREAM. Where the child slumbereth, While he on sun-lighted Laughingly, gleefully SECOND DREAM. I seek the foul and clammy air And sweep his limbs with mountain wind; With outflung hands that jar his chain, THIRD DREAM. Soft is the flush on the maiden's cheek, Parted the warm lips, as if to speak The name in her heart when she sank to rest. Low to her ear with a tender word Bending, she calls me the sacred name, And the dove in her bosom my voice has stirred Flutters with love and with happy shame. FOURTH DREAM. Where the old man's temples feebly Take his cold and shrunken hand, Blithely fills his mother's room Once again, in thoughtless joyance, Earth to him is faëry ground, Where, against all harm and dolor, Home has drawn its charmed round! Through the blessed time of slumber Thus I rock his weary heart, Till from pity of his waking Weeping, sadly I depart. FIFTH DREAM I know my coward victim well. I burst the terrible gates of Hell,. The ice that covered his lying brow SIXTH DREAM. Quiet keep! her weary spirit, Patient now, with Heaven so near it, Not the ills of Being, merely; SUGGESTED BY THE BEAUTIFUL FRONTISPIECE IN THE JANUARY NUMBER OF SARTAIN'S MAGAZINE. BY EDITH MAY. SPRING is the sweet soul of the shrouded year; That, wandering from the Arctic, makes its nest The red marsh berry, and the mailed buds THE names of William and Mary Howitt are not more constantly associated in the minds of all who are acquainted with the literature of England than they are indissolubly united in the hearts of those who have ever enjoyed the privilege of seeing them in their happy domestic life. They have steadily improved and extended, in the course of their earnest literary labours, the reputation which their early works gained for them; and through the long course of their married life, chequered with life's joys and sorrows, they have preserved in all the freshness of youth, the tastes and sympathies which originally drew them together. It is a quarter of a century since they published "The Forest Minstrel" together, soon after their marriage, and since they travelled over the Highlands of Scotland and the sweet pastoral country of the borders, chiefly on foot; but they can still, with the same unity of spirit animating a diversity of genius, fill up different parts of the same poem, or different descriptions in the same story, or watch over and enjoy the progress of their mutual works; or find pleasure in congenial society, or in the peace and beauty of fields and woods. Qualities of sterling value, a happy mixture of energy, good sense, and the true Saxon power to work with a ready sympathy for all that is good and lovely in nature and humanity, and the power to express it, mixed in different proportions in each, have led to these results. It would not have been the same, had one been all solid prose, and the other all spiritual poetry. This might work well also, but it would be in a different way. It is the combination of both in each, in somewhat different proportions, which has made their life what it is. Mr. Howitt has, however, another and a very essential characteristic beyond. It is a peculiar sturdiness, an uncompromising uprightness, which occasionally gives the impression that he has a hardness of character, while in reality he has a childlike sensitiveness for all simple goodness and truth and human emotion. But with whatever appears to his convictions evil, in things small or great, he at war, and he never makes it any secret that he is so. Hence he is called antagonistic. He is, however, genial and cheerful in temperament, and singularly unsuspicious, never imagining or suspecting ill, and this may be one reason why he is so impatient of it when it is forced upon him. He is quite unaffected, being an individual character; "a man," as Carlyle would say, and quite sincere. Whatever opinion he advocates, it is assuredly that which he believes to be right. He would never argue for victory, nor write contradictions to make brilliant periods. He is unimpressible by any factitious or conventional circumstances, and would be the same William Howitt in the midst of the most splendid aristocratic circles, that he is in his own house, among his family and friends, or that he was in the humblest cottage in which he received a welcome, when he was acquiring the knowledge of the habits and manners of his countrymen of all classes, which enabled him to write his "Rural Life in England." On the other hand, and how important to mutual happiness this has been will at once be perceived, never was quotation more aptly applied than the lines of Chaucer, appended to the notice of Mary Howitt, by the editor of "The New Spirit of the Age." "And so discreet and fair of eloquence, And all was conscience and tender heart." As a farther and very important characteristic in a woman, she has that talent which can insure "a well-ordered home." In her qualities of wife and mother, and mistress of a family, she is admirable no less than in her beautiful ballads and lyrics, and a chance visiter may often find her employed, as Burns describes the mother, "wi' her needle and her shears." People are beginning to forget the very epithet of "blue stocking" now. It is so common for women to write, that individual authoresses are not tempted by distinction to affect singularities. But, whatever taint of pedantry may still attach to any of them, Mrs. Howitt has not a shadow of it. A stranger, not having learned her name, would indeed be struck by her conversation, full of intelligence, and the spiritual light in her eyes, but might never discover that she was one of the most popular writers of the day; and should any within her reach need her help in sickness or sorrow, they will find that a love of the ideal does not blunt the true woman's sympathies or interference with her especial work. Only to enumerate the names of the published works of William and Mary Howitt is enough, without any comment, to show their unwearied industry, and the titles will bring to those who have read them many a pleasant recollection of healthy and natural emotions, a spirit of fresh life and energy, and a sense of the beauty and poetry diffused throughout nature. Their "Forest Minstrel" was followed by the "Desolation of Eyam, and other Poems," and for some time their names were seen in most of the annuals and periodicals of the day, always with increasing popularity. Mr. Howitt's first prose work was "The Book of the Seasons," now to be found in every library, and which has gone through countless editions, but which met with such repeated refusals from the publishers to whom it was offered, that the author, in disgust, had once directed the friend who took charge of the manuscript to tie a stone round it and fling it over London Bridge. The "History of Priestcraft" followed, as if to show that William Howitt was as alive to the influences that have depressed and demoralized humanity as to those which, in the gentle ministry of nature, surround it ever with a blessing; and in this, as well as all his other works, is to be traced a highly devotional spirit, and a deep reverence for pure Christianity. The History of Priestcraft is now in its ninth edition, and the editions have always been of from two to three thousand copies. It was followed by "Colonization and Christianity," a painful but most necessary lesson, and one that has doubtless exercised a powerful influence, and assisted in bringing on the improved state of feeling and action which at last begins to manifest itself with regard to the aborigines of those vast countries over which the European races are fast spreading. But the delightful and deservedly popular "Rural Life in England," originally in two volumes, is, perhaps, of all Mr. Howitt's works, that which we should select as a type of the author and a lifelike portrait of its subject. It is no work of imagination. He traversed old England from north to south, and from east to west, to gain a thorough knowledge of the manners and customs of the people. No one can read his descriptions ⚫ without perceiving the truth of them. What mere literary man, for example, could ever have invented that feast-day at the farmhouse, or the ploughman's breakfast in one of the midland counties? And who, that had not walked over the breezy commons, and dived into the green woods, and looked from some grassy hill over the wide landscape, rich in verdure and cultivation, could place them all before us with such freshness and truth? These descriptions seem to bring a bracing air and vigorous life with them. They are in writing what Creswick's pictures are in painting. In the chapter devoted to the "New Forest," we are especially reminded of him, where "lovely streams come winding out of the shades and hasten towards the sea," and "you get glimpses of forest glades, and peeps under the trees into distant park-like expanses, or heathy wastes," and "the deer are wandering here and there." Our limits will only permit us to enumerate the remaining works of Mr. Howitt, which indeed are most of them too well known to need comment. There are the two volumes of "Visits to Remarkable Places;" and then the Rural and Domestic Life of Germany," the "Student Life of Germany," a translation, and "German Experiences," in one volume each, and all of them the results of a residence of some years in that country, chiefly for the sake of the advantages it offered for educating the young family now growing up around him. The "Travels of a Journeyman Tailor" is also a translation. The " Boy's Country Book" would command a unanimous vote of approbation from all its constituency, if they were called on for an opinion. 66 'Jack of the Mill" is also a boy's book. The "History of the Aristocracy" may stand as a companion to the "History of Priestcraft." Then follow the "Hall and the Hamlet," and "Homes and Haunts of the Poets," both in two volumes, in that pleasant style peculiar to their author. Two tales, in one volume each, succeeded them, My Uncle the Clockmaker," and "No Sense like Common Sense." We have also two translations, Miss Bremer's "Parsonage of Mora," and the inimitable "Peter Schlemil." The two volumes entitled "Pantika, or Traditions of the Most Ancient Times," stand alone, as yet, among Mr. Howitt's works, and prove the extraordinary variety of his powers. These tales are full of poetical and powerful description, of lofty thoughts and fine invention. There are also, of his, many short poems of great beauty scattered through various publications, which ought to be collected. In this wide and varied range of work Mr. Howitt is always true to himself. His style is entirely individual, and has not a particle of imitation in it. He is always original and fresh, and the title alone of his work now in the press-"Green Boughs from the Forest"brings an exhilarating, aromatic sensation with it. |