Where now are the giants, the soil who possest,*
When our fathers came down from the land of the west
The grass o'er the mounds, and their fortresses waves,
And choak'd amid weeds are the stones on their graves;
The hunter yet lingers in wonder, where keeps
The rock on the mountains, the track of their steps;
Nor other memorial remains there, nor trace,
Of the proud ALLEGEWI's invincible race.
As their nation was slain by the hands of our sires,
Our race, in our turn, from our country expires !
Lo! even like some tree, where a spirit beforet
Had dwelt, when rich garlands and offerings it bore,
But now, half uptorn from its bed in the sands,
By the wild waves encroaching, that desolate stands,
Despoil'd of the pride of its foliage and fruit,
While its branches are naked, and bare is its root;
And each surge that returns still is wearing its bed,
Till it falls, and the ocean rolls on overhead;

• The tradition of the Lenapé is, that when their fathers crossed the Mississippi, they met, on this side of it, with a nation called Alligewi, from whom the Alleghany river and mountain received their name.

Many 'wonderful things,' says Hickewelder, ' are told of this famous people. They are said to be remarkably stout and tall, and there is a tradition that there were giants among them,-people of a much larger size than the tallest of the Lenapé. It is relaied that they had built to themselves regular fortifications, or entrenchments, from whence they would sally out, but were generally repulsed.' The traces of gigantic feet, in differents parts of the country, mentioned in several books, are ascribed to this people in the text.”

t« Autrefois les sanvages voisins de l'Acardie avoient dans leur pays, sur le bord de la mer, nu arbre extrémement vieux, dont ils racontoient bieu des merveilles, et qu'on voyoit toujours chargé d'offrandes. La mer avant déconvert tonte sa racine, il se soậtint encore longtems presqu'en l'air contre la violence des veuts et des flots, ce qui confirme ces sauvages dans la pensée qu'il étoit la siege de quelque grand esprit; sa chute ne fut pas même capable de le détromper, et tant qu'il en parut quelque tont de branches hors de l'ean, en lui rendit les mêmes honneurs, qu'avoit reçus tout l'arbre, lorsqu'il étoit sur pied."

Charleroux, p. 349.

Nor a wreck on the shore, uor a track on the flood,
Tells ought of the trunk that so gloriously stood ;
Even so shall our nations, the children of earth,
Return to that bosom that yielded them birth.
Ye tribes of the Eagle, the PANTHER, and WOLF !
Deep sunk lie your names in a fathomless gulf!..
Your war-whoop's last echo has died on the shore;
The smoke of your wigwams is curling no more.
Mourn, land of my fathers ! thy children are dead,
Like the mists in the sun-beam, thy warriors have fled !

4.
But a spirit there is, who his presence enshrouds,
Enthroned on our hills in his mantle of clouds.
He speaks in the whirlwind; the river outpours
Its tribute to him, where the cataract roars ;
His breath is the air we inhale; and his reign
Shall endure till the waters have triumph'd again ;
Till the earth's deep foundation convulsions shall heave,
And the bosom of darkness its fabric receive !
'Tis THE SPIRIT OF FREEDOM ! and ne'er shall our grave
Be trod by the recreant, or spurn’d by the slave !
And lo! as the vision of years rolls away,
When our tribes shall have past, and the victor hath

sway. That spirit I mark o'er the war-cloud presiding, The storm that rolls upward sublime he is guiding; It is bursting in terror; and choak’d is the path of peace, by the ruins it whelms in its wrath. The rivers run blood; and the war caldron boils, i By the flame of their cities, the blaze of their spoils.. Bend, bend, from your clouds, and rejoice in the sight, Ye ghosts of the red men ! for freedom they fight !

5. Dim visions, why crowd ye so fast o'er my eyes, In the twilight of days that are yet to arise ? Undefin'd are the shapes, and the masses that sweep, Like the hurricane clouds, o'er the face of the deep; They rise like the waves on the surf-beaten shore, But recede ere they form, or be gaz'd on no more. Like the swarms of the doves o'er the meads that de

scend,* From the north’s frozen regions, their course when they

bend, So quick o'er our plains, is the multitude's motion, Still the white sails gleam thick o'er the bosom of ocean; As the foam of their furrows is lost in the sea, So they melt in one nation, united and free!

6. Mourn, land of my father ! the red men have past, Like the strown leaves of autumn, dispers’d by the blast! Mourn, land of the victor! a curse shall remain, Till appeas'd in their clime are the ghosts of the slain ! Like the plants that by pure hands of virgins alone Must be pluck’d,+ or their charm and their virtue isgone, So the fair fruits of freedom, souls only can taste That are stain'd by no crime, by no passion debas'd.

“We embarked, and made towards a meadow, in the neighbourbood of which, the trees were covered with that sort of fowl, more than with leaves; for, just then 'twas the season in which they retire from the north countries, and repair to the southern climates; and one would have thought that all the turtle doves upon earth had chose to pass through this place. For the eighteen or twenty days that we stayed there, I firmly believe, that a thousand men might have fed upon them heartily, without putting themselves to any trouble.”

La Hontan, I. p. 62. of "L'on montre certaines plantes fort salutaires, qui n'ont point de vertu, disent les sauvages, si elles ne sont employées par de mains vierges."-Charlevoix, p. 350.

His nest, where the foul bird of avarice* hath made
The songsters, in terror, take wing from the shade ;
And man, if unclean in his bosom the fire,
No holier spirits descend to inspire.
Mourn, land of the victor! our curse shall remain,
Till appeas'd for their wrongs be the souls of the slain !

THE L A PLAND SACRIFICE,

AND
THE ISLE OF FOUNTS.

It may appear doubtful to some, whether the poetry of feeling, or the poetry of imagination, is of the highest order. Mr. Butler, in his reminiscences, says that Gray's Poems rank higher than those of Goldsmith; but Goldsmith is the bard of feeling, Gray of imagination. . It would seem; then, that the preference is given to the poetry of imagination ; but of this there is much reason to doubt, though Mr. Butler says that “ If all the printed copies of the poems of Gray were annihilated, there is not a county in England, or parish in London, in which all his English and all his Latin Odes, and his incomparable Elegy, might not be supplied by the recollections of some of their inhabitants;” and adds “how very little of Goldsmith is known by heart.” We must confess, with all due respect to Mr. Butler's age, long experience, and judgment, we are quite of a contrary opinion. We never knew many who had any pretensions to learning, or even to that “ little learning” which Pope thinks “a dangerous thing,” who could not repeat a considerable part of Goldsmith; and we never knew any who

seemed to have any knowledge of Gray except professed scholars, who, in general, are more desirous of knowing what is admirable than what is affecting. When we read Gray we are led into the ideal world : every thing is new to us, and novelty is always a source of admiration. What can be more admirable, when philosophically considered, than the structure of the universe, the revolution of the celestial bodies, the splendor and glory of the starry heavens, and yet from their being always presented to our view, we never admire them, except when we abstract from our feelings, and make them a source of philosophic contemplation. It is so with Goldsmith: he only describes the feelings, sympathies, and emotions of our own hearts, and we love him for doing so, though we cannot admire him. We feel he is one of ourselves, subject to the same influences; capable of the same affections; and therefore we cling to him, we love to associate with him, as all kindred natures love to associate with each other. Pares cum paribus facile congregantur. It is different with Gray: he writes nothing dictated by his feelings, or by his heart. He appeals to the understanding and the imagination alone. Even in his celebrated elegy he expresses only those sentiments which naturally occur to a philosophic mind in contemplating the final destiny of beings whose existence is limited to a contracted span. Whatever incidental remarks arise from this contemplation in his. Elegy, have no reference to the heart, or its affections. He looked only to the intellectual part of our nature, for he wrote not what his feelings, but what his understanding dictated : witness his celebrated Stanza on the destiny of genius.

Full many a gem, of purest ray serene,

The dark, unfathom'd caves of ocean bear;
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,

And waste its sweetness in the desert air. Gray, then, by describing only the higher characters of mind, by leading us perpetually into the ideal world, is always presenting something to us placed

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