THEN she seemed to rise in stature, And there was a light of glory Startled by the transformation Wondering at her awful beauty Gazed the vulgar crowd; In their light the mists and shadows From the future roll. Lo! I see a power arising Ye shall not control; Judge and ruler, priest and people, Cease your cruel persecutions As of old He came to Edom, Fills your ruined town; Only DEATH may dwell, When GOD leaveth no one living Of His wrath to tell. So she ended. Awe and silence IX. 'AND did GOD,' asked little MARY, 'All the town destroy?' 'Wait and hear the story ended,' Said the elder boy: 'If they ceased their persecutions, GOD would not destroy." MORNING o'er the Pilgrim city Breaking still and sweet, And the voices of the people From afar the heavy rolling Of the muffled drum, With the measured tread of soldiers And the general hum, While her words went through the still- Warned the captive in the prison That the hour had come. All her simple garb arranging With a decent care, Knelt she in a holy silence, Lost in secret prayer, While her radiant face attested GOD was with her there. VOL. XLII. 40 ON the scaffold MARY DYER Standeth silent now, Then Priest WILSON, full of scorning, But she answered: 'I have sought you, That you might repent.' 'Will you leave us, leave us ever, Vex us never more, If your vagrant life we give you, XIII. MOVED the mighty deep within her For a little space, And a surge of human feeling Broke across her face; Then out-shone the greater glory Of the heavenly grace, As all loves of earth descended Seemed she in transfiguration; Such a light was shed, Like a halo from her spirit Round about her head, That o'er all the ghastly gibbet The effulgence spread. XIV, THEN ONE WEBB, the burly captain, 'MARY, be your blood upon you; By the Law, which you have broken, Not by us, 't is shed.' And he gave the fearful signal, While she meekly bowed; XV. FOR the people stood awe-stricken Some who seemed to feel a shadow Feared the dreaded day of vengeance Some believed they saw the spirit With a slow majestic motion Floating to the skies; And all these believed the martyr's XVI. NOT in vain had MARY DYER For the noble Pilgrim people Curbed their ruler's pride. For their faith one other martyr * THE incidents of the poem are purely historical; the actors, their names and titles, are all real; and times and places are according to the annals. MARY DYER was a respectable woman, the wife of a reputable inhabitant of Rhode-Island, and the mother of several children. Believing it to be her duty to accompany two friends to Boston, to induce the authorities to repeal the sanguinary laws against Quakers and other dissenters, they went there in September, 1659. The three were arrested 'for being Quakers,' tried as heretics, and banished under pain of death, being allowed two days to depart. Found subse EXTRACTS FROM A TRAVELLER'S NOTE-BOOK. BY WILLIAM W. CAMPBELL. IONA AND STAFFA. Ir was a dismal, rainy day when we dropped our anchor near Iona. Wet and weary, I first set foot on the sands of this famous island. The Christian pilgrim, wandering over the plains of ancient Judea, standing for the first time in the streets of the modern Jerusalem, can hardly realize that he is upon the spot which has been rendered memorable by the life and the death of the SON of GOD. Disappointment may come at first; but as he reflects, amid the sacred places which our SAVIOUR frequented while on earth, imagination more easily cements the present with the past history of our race and the world; and then kindles up, as the thought steals on, that the hoary hills which stand around the sacred city have been witnesses of events which not only connect the present with the past, but which link all the present and all the past with the great, unbounded, and never-ending future. The traveller, also, who feels sympathy with the advance of Christian learning, truth, and civilization, can hardly fail to have his sensibilities awakened as he visits cities and islands which were frequented by the early followers of the Cross. Iona is a sacred spot. As we approached it, there was some feeling of disappointment. True, in my own experience, were the lines of Wordsworth: 'How sad a welcome! to each voyager Some ragged child holds up for sale, a store quently within the jurisdiction, they were again arrested and sentenced to death. The two men were executed on the afternoon of October twenty-seventh, and their dead bodies subjected to the most revolting indignities: denied burial, or coffins, or clothing, they were thrown naked into a pit, which happening to fill with water, alone protected them from beasts of prey. MARY DYER was reprieved under the gallows at the intercession of her son, and sent home; but returning in April following, she was again arrested, the sentence confirmed, and she led to execution on the morning of June first, 1660. The distance to the gallows was one mile; and the drums were ordered to beat whenever she attempted to speak on her way thither. On the scaffold her life was again offered her, if she would for ever depart the jurisdiction; but she could not accept such conditions. Her meekness, Christian endurance, and death, aroused great sympathy in the colonies, as well as in England, and she was the last but one of the Quakers put to death in America, for the royal mandamus of CHARLES II., requiring their liberation from prison and exemption from persecution, was signed by the King, September ninth, 1660, and proclaimed in New-England about two months after; whereupon the Quakers held a general thanksgiving in Boston. History has few examples of greater suffering, or of higher heroism, than were endured: and exhibited by the early Quakers in various parts of the world; and the author of MARY DYER proposes to commemorate the great events of Quaker history in a series of similar lyrics,. comprising about ten in number, to appear from time to time in the KNICKERBOCKER, if they shall prove acceptable to its readers. The second 'Lay' will have for its subject the visit of MARY FISHER (a Quaker lady of beauty and culture, who had been scourged and imprisoned repeatedly in New-England) to Sultan MAHOMET IV., at Adrianople, fifty years before Madame MONTAGUE's journey there, and which, taken all in all, is an act of the purest heroism in human annals. But busy memory called up the celebrated passage in Dr. Johnson's Tour to the Hebrides: 'WE were now treading that illustrious island which was once the luminary of the Caledonian regions, whence savage clans and roving barbarians derived the benefits of knowledge and the blessings of religion. To abstract the mind from all local emotion would be impossible if it were endeavored, and would be foolish if it were possible. Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses, whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future, predominate over the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings. Far from me, and from my friends, be such frigid philosophy as may conduct us indifferent and unmoved over any ground which has been dignified by wisdom, bravery, or virtue. That man is little to be envied, whose patriotism would not gain force upon the plain of Marathon, or whose piety would not grow warmer among the ruins of Iona.' a mere This little island, only three miles long by one in breadth dot in the ocean-looking out on the rugged rocks of Mull, and buffeted by stormy waves-has yet borne no inconsiderable part in the spread of Christianity in Western Europe. Its history is one of great interest. About the year 372, there was born on the banks of the Clyde, not far from Glasgow in Scotland, a child whose surname was Succat. This was the future St. Patrick. His life was eventful. When a mere youth, he was stolen from his home and carried a slave to Ireland; and was engaged in the humble occupation of a swine-herd. Restored afterward to his family, but having, during his captivity, while reflecting on the pious teachings of his mother, become a freeman indeed a freeman whom the truth makes free'- he resolved to return to Ireland, and preach there the gospel of Christ. In his subsequent career in the Emerald Isle, he was eminently successful; and, living in a rude and superstitious age, truth and fable have sometimes united in the history of his deeds. Whether he destroyed the serpents and all venomous reptiles, and chased out of Ireland the great Arch-Enemy of Man; hurling after him, as he fled toward Scotland, the two great rocks which lie in the Clyde-one, on which rests the castle of Dumbarton, and the other, the vast rock of Ailsie-it is not necessary to inquire. At all events, there must have been some commotion in the air and in the water by their removal; and sufficient, one would think, to frighten even his Satanic Majesty. However this may be, a follower of St. Patrick reflected and considered that there was a debt due to Scotland; not because the great traitor had been driven over there, but rather for the reason that it was the birthplace of the great Christian teacher. Shall he not repay to the country of Succat what Succat had imported to his?' 'I will go,' said he, and preach the word of GOD in Scotland.' This was Columba, a descendant of an Irish monarch. It was nearly two centuries after the time of St. Patrick, that Columba resolved to pay the debt. In the year 565, he and a few followers landed upon the island afterward known as Iona, or the 'Island of Columba's cell.' Here he proclaimed that the Holy Scriptures were the only rule of faith. Here the schools of the Church were established. Here the missionary fire was kindled, and this little spot became literally the 'luminary of the Caledonian regions.' Here, under various tides of fortune, and with dif ferent success, the gospel was preached for more than a thousand years. But her glory has departed. The ruins are there—the walls and tower of the old cathedral, the remains of a nunnery, and a chapel - but the missionary-fire has gone out lang syne. As we moved about, we could but feel the solemnity of the place; for we were treading on the dust of monarchs, noblemen, and yeomen, as well as on that of the priest and the peasant; for, by its sacred character, it became the burial-place of many of the families of Scotland. Leaving Iona, we bore away for the Cave of Fingal and the Island of Staffa: "MERRILY, merrily, goes the bark On a breeze from the northward free: So shoots through the morning-sky the lark, The shores of Mull on the eastward lay, And all the group of islets gay That guard famed Staffa round: There all unknown its columns rose, And the shy seal had quiet home, Nature herself, it seemed, would raise That Nature's voice might seem to say: 'Well hast thou done, frail child of clay! Thy humble powers that stately shrine Tasked high and hard- but witness mine!'' About nine miles to the north of Iona, and eight miles from the western coast of Mull, rises the famed isle of Staffa. Of irregular shape, and only three quarters of a mile in length by half a mile in width, it forms but a mere speck in the vast Atlantic. It is one immense rock; on the top a green pasture spreads out, supported by vast basaltic columns. A few cattle were grazing quietly here, but there is no human habitation upon the island; and, save when startled by the visitor, the cormorant might still find 'Dark and undisturbed repose.' On the southerly side, the rocks rise to the height of nearly one hundred and fifty feet. The pillars extend along in a continuous colonnade, and looking down from the summit on the dashing waves below, the scene is wild and impressive. There are several caves; but that which bears the name of the father of Ossian, the Cave of Fingal, is the crowning wonder of this wonderful island. 'A vast archway of nearly seventy feet in height, supporting a massive entablature of thirty feet additional, and receding for about two hundred and thirty feet inward; the entire front, as well as the great, cavernous sides, being composed of countless complicated ranges of gigantic columns, beautifully jointed, and of most |