his utterance, produced a short period of confusion in the faculties of all present. When Middleton and Hard-Heart, each of whom had involuntarily extended a hand to support the form of the old man, turned to him again, they found that the subject of their interest was removed forever beyond the necessity of their care. They mournfully placed the body in its seat, and the voice of the old Indian, who arose to announce the termination of the scene to the tribe, seemed a sort of echo from that invisible world to which the meek spirit of the trapper had just departed. "A valiant, a just, and a wise warrior has gone on the path which will lead him to the blessed grounds of his people!" he said. "When the voice of the Wahcondah called him, he was ready to answer. Go, my children; remember the just chief of the pale-faces, and clear your own tracks from briers!"

11. The grave was made beneath the shade of some noble oaks. It has been carefully watched to the present hour by the Pawnees of the Loup, and is often shown to the traveler and the trader as a spot where a just white man sleeps. In due time the stone was placed at its head, with the simple inscription which the trapper had himself requested. The only liberty taken by Middleton was to add-"MAY NO WANTON HAND EVER DISTURB HIS REMAINS."

JAMES FENNIMORE COOPER.

JAMES FENNIMORE COOPER, the celebrated American novelist, was born at Burlington, New Jersey, in 1789. His father, Judge William Cooper, born in Pennsylvania, became possessed, in 1785, of a large tract of land near Otsego Lake, in the State of New York, where, in the spring of 1786, he erected the first house in Cooperstown. In 1795 and 1799 he was elected to represent that district in Congress. Here the novelist chiefly passed his boyhood to his thir teenth year, and became perfectly conversant with frontier life. At that early age he entered Yale College, where he remained three years, when he obtained a midshipman's commission and entered the navy. He passed the six following years in that service, and thus became master of the second great field of his future literary career. In 1811 he resigned his commission, married Miss Delancey, a descendant of one of the oldest and most influential families in America, and settled down to a home life in Westchester, near New York, where he resided for a short time before removing to Cooperstown. Here he wrote his first book, "Precaution." This was followed, in 1821, by "The Spy," one of the be t of all historical romances. It was almost immediately republished in all parts of Europe. It was followed, two years later, by "The Pioneers." "The Pilot," the first of his sea novels, next appeared. It is one of the most remark able novels of the time, and everywhere obtained instant and high applause. In 1826 he visited Europe, where his reputation was already well established as one of the greatest writers of romantic fiction which our age has produced. He passed several years abroad, and was warmly welcomed in every country he visited. His literary activity was not impaired by his change of scene, as sev

eral of his best works were written while traveling. He returned home in 1833. "The Prairie," from which the above touching and effective scene was taken, the first of his works written in Europe, published in 1827, was one of the most successful of the novelist's productions. His writings throughout are distinguished by purity and brilliancy of no common merit. He was alike remarkable for his fine commanding person, his manly, resolute, independent nature, and his noble, generous heart. He died at Cooperstown, September 14, 1851.

VI.

134. ELEGY IN A COUNTRY CHURCH-YARD.

HE curfew tolls the knell of parting day,

TH

The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea,
The plowman homeward plods his weary way,

And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

2. Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds;

3. Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tower

The moping owl does to the moon complain
Of such as, wandering near her secret bower,
Molest her ancient solitary reign.

4. Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a moldering heap,
Each in his narrow cell forever laid,

The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.

5. The breezy call of incense-breathing morn,

The swallow twittering from the straw-built shed,
The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,

No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.
6. For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,
Or busy housewife ply her evening care;
No children run to lisp their sire's return,
Or climb his knees, the envied kiss to share.

7. Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,

Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke :
How jocund did they drive their team ǎfield!
How bowed the woods beneath their sturdy stroke

8. Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,

Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor Grandeur hear, with a disdainful smile,
The short and simple annals of the poor.
9. The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,
And all that beauty, all that wealth, e'er gave,
Await alike th' inevitable hour:

The paths of glory lead but to the grave. 10. Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault,

If Memory o'er their tomb no trophies raise,
Where through the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault
The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.

11. Can storied urn, or animated bust,

Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?
Can Honor's voice provoke the silent dust,
Or Flattery soothe the dull, cold ear of death?

12. Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid

Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire;
Hands that the rod of empire might have swayed,
Or waked to ecstasy the living lyre:

13. But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page,
Rich with the spoils of time, did ne'er unroll ;
Chill Penury repressed their noble rage,
And froze the genial current of the soul.
14. Full many a gem, of pūrèst ray serene,

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

And waste its sweetness on the desert air.
15. Some village Hampden, that with dauntless breast
The little tyrant of his fields withstood,-
Some mute, inglorious Milton,-here may rest;
Some Cromwell, guiltless of his country's blood.
16. Th' applause of listening senates to command,
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,
To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,

And read their history in a nation's eyes,

17. Their lot forbåde: nor circumscribed alone

Their growing virtues, but their crimes confined;

Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne,
And shut the gates of mercy on mankind;
18. The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide,
To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,
Or heap the shrine of luxury and pride

With incense kindled at the Muse's flame.
19. Far from the maddening crowd's ignoble strife,
Their sober wishes never learned to stray;
Along the cool, sequestered vale of life

They kept the noiseless tenor of their way. 20. Yet e'en these bōnes from insult to protect, Some frail memorial still erected nigh,

With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture decked,
Implores the passing tribute of a sigh.

21. Their name, their years, spelt by th' unlettered Muse, The place of fame and elegy supply;

And many a holy text around she strews, That teach the rustic mõralist to die. 22. For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey,

This pleasing, anxious being e'er resigned,
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,

Nor cast one longing, lingering look behind? 23. On some fond breast the parting soul relies, Some pious drops the closing eye requires; E'en from the tomb the voice of nature cries, E'en in our ashes live their wonted (wunt'ed) fires. 24. For thee, who, mindful of th' unhonored dead, Dost in these lines their artless tale relate, If 'chance, by lonely contemplation led, Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate,— 25. Haply some hoary-headed swain may say, 'Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn, Brushing with hasty steps the dews away,

To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.
26. "There, at the foot of yonder nodding beech,
That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high,
His listless length at noontide would he stretch,
And pōre upon the brook that babbles by.

27. "Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn, Muttering his wayward fancies, would he rove, Now drooping, woful-wan, like one forlorn,

Or crazed with care, or crossed in hopeless love. 28. One morn I missed him on the customed hill, Along the heath, and near his favorite tree : Another came,-nor yet beside the rill,

Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood, was he :

29. "The next, with dirges due, in sad array,

Slow through the churchway path we saw him bōrne;
Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay
Graved on the stone beneath yon agèd thorn."

THE EPITAPH.

HERE RESTS HIS HEAD UPON THE LAP OF EARTH,
A YOUTH TO FORTUNE AND TO FAME UNKNOWN :
FAIR SCIENCE FROWNED NOT ON HIS HUMBLE BIRTH,
AND MELANCHOLY MARKED HIM FOR HER OWN.
LARGE WAS HIS BOUNTY, AND HIS SOUL SINCERE,

HEAVEN DID A RECOMPENSE AS LARGELY SEND:

HE GAVE TO MISERY-ALL HE HAD-A TEAR,

HE GAINED FROM HEAVEN ('TWAS ALL HE WISHED) A FRIEND.

NO FURTHER SEEK HIS MERITS TO DISCLOSE,

OR DRAW HIS FRAILTIES FROM THEIR DREAD ABODE,

(THERE THEY ALIKE IN TREMBLING HOPE REPOSE,)

THE BOSOM OF HIS FATHER AND HIS GOD.

GRAY.

SECTION XXV.

I.

135. THE PHANTOM SHIP.

1.

HE breeze had sunk to rest, the noonday sun was high,

Tandrena lor est lay motionless beneath a cloudless sky,

There was silence in the air, there was silence in the deep; And it seemed as though that burning calm were nature's final sleep.