pride overpowers him; an ecstasy that swells all the higher from the consciousness (whether he will confess it or not) that he has taken the first step toward immortality. The critics take care to dispel all such pleasing illusions. A letter from his mother did the work as effectually in the mind of the author of the Greenland Processes. The good woman, hearing that her son had published a book, began to believe it at last possible that he might actually produce a sermon; so she wrote to Friedrich, desiring him to come to Hof, where there was a chance of his being permitted to preach in the Hospital Church. Such a proposal operated like a cold bath on any remains there might have been of the author's self-satisfaction. Jean Paul's answer shows he thought no better of his private critic than modern writers do of official reviewers. "What is a sermon," returned he," but something every student can make and deliver? But do you suppose that all your clergymen in Hof can understand a line of my book, to say nothing of being able to write it?"

Unfortunately for Richter, the speculation Voss embarked in did not suceed: the Greenland Processes was printed, but nobody bought or read the book. The world had something better to do; far greater trifles claimed its attention. The Cagliostrians and Rosicrucians occupied the attention of politicians; the fashionable world was just then horrified at the wife of one of the court-councilors passing the the lady of the president without greeting her. In another rank a dreadful tale was going the round of the tea-tables: the comptroller's wife, forgetful of her station, had given orders for a new velvet mantle with a broad fringe! A new actress had appeared in one of the theaters, or some siren's bell-like voice was to be heard; to-day there was to be a procession, and to-morrow a deserter was to be shot. How, in the face of so many comedies and tragedies, could time or inclination be found for reading the Greenland Processes? Just as the public ignored the work, so did the critics. Editors and reviewers disdained to notice a writer who had neither contributed to nor corresponded with them. A solitary scribe in Leipsic condescended, with an undisguised sneer, to notice the work in these terms: "Much, perhaps all, the author has written with great bitterness against literature, theology, wives,

coxcombs, etc., may be true, but we have no doubt whatever that the attempt at wit, which is evident on every page, will excite disgust in the mind of the rational reader, and lead him to throw the book aside with contempt."

A potosi of sixteen louis-d'ors is very soon exhausted; a fresh shaft must be sunk. The Selections from the Papers of the Devil was tried; but Voss declined the publication, vehemently protesting that he had suffered quite enough loss by the Greenland Processes. The manuscript traveled over all Germany, and from every journey returned with the invariable reply: "We thank you for your esteemed offer, but regret that our time and resources are fully engrossed by other undertakings."

:

A ship is dashed to pieces on a rock; the crew are drowning; boards and planks, spars and masts, are drifting about amid the waves; from the surging flood a hand is thrust up; it grasps a beam, and holds fast by it, and the elements lose one of their victims. The demons of the sea are laughing; sure of their prey, they mock the struggle of the swimmer: "Look, poor wretch; stare your very eyes blind; wave your white signal in the wind, and burst with your wail of anguish but no sail comes in sight. Tremble, and say your last prayer, if you can; for see, there swims the shark: a moment, and all is over with you!" The situation has often been represented in smaller or larger paintings: it was the situation of Richter. He had shouted himself hoarse, and the only answer to his cry had been the murmur of the waves; he had looked himself blind, and the white sail—the letter that announced the acceptance of his manuscript -had never hove in sight. The shark swims toward him—the prospect of disgrace and destitution! Are his lips uttering their last prayer? No! Richter will fight with the shark for life or death.

Weeks and months rush past us like the wind; we see not from whence the whirlwind comes nor whither it goes. A morning chases away the evening; to-day replaces yesterday; we complete another year, we know not how, we whose lives are happy, or even tolerably so. But the poor, the unfortunate? Time flies with rapid wing over plenty and enjoyment, but slowly the days and hours of poverty drag their lengths along. In winter, spring is

longed for on account of its lengthening days and greater warmth; in summer, the shorter days of autumn are looked forward to, which yield a few hours more rest to the weary body. In this manner, during his three years' residence in Leipsic, Jean Paul told off his evil hours and dreary days; he deluged the journals and newspapers with essays and treatises, wrote verses to order, also congratulations and wedding-eve jokes, and filled whole chests with the extracts he had made from borrowed books. By this means, indeed, he became possessed of a library, for books he did not possess. A vehement, but yet measured heat burned within him. Necessity and destitution had lost their sting for him; he has looked despair in the face, and found that it has nothing maddening for him. His philosophy consoles him with the assurance that hunger and nakedness, perils and contempt, yea ofttimes the cross and the poisoned cup, have been the reward the world has given for wisdom. In all ages and countries the world has neglected its benefactors and persecuted its poets and instructors: Roger Bacon and Galileo pined away in the prisons of the inquisition; Torquato Tasso was confined in the cell of a madhouse; Camoens died in the streets of Lisbon, a beggar; and Burns; a thorough-bred steed of Phobus, was compelled to drudge all his days in the gear of a cart-horse. But the gold that is thrown into the hottest melting-pot comes out the purest, and the canary-bird sings all the sweeter the longer it has been trained in a darkened cage.

Jean Paul betook himself to literature, in the first instance, as the only means of providing himself with a living; he wrote, in fact, to get money--to live. In the further prosecution of this course, the material aim gradually began to disappear. Jean Paul will labor on, and think and feel, and will still demand, and at length receive recognition; literature ceases to be a means, and becomes an end with him; the struggle for existence merges in a struggle for recognition.

Many years ago, at Paris, in the early dawn, a young man was discovered hanging under the eaves of a house, close by the trellis of a window. A thin silken cord tightly twisted round his throat, had done the hangman's work. The scene quickly attracted all the curious and the idle. The noble, aristocratic features of the dead,

the delicate white hands, plainly showed that the unfortunate man had at one time occupied a higher position than the tattered clothes in which he was concealed would lead one to suppose. His person was searched for papers that might throw some light upon the event; nothing was found, however; he had kept everything to himself, like a true philosopher. Passersby at length identified him. This suicide in rags was one of the most distinguished and brilliant geniuses of modern French literature, whose wit threw every saloon and boudoir into ecstasy-Gerhard de Nerval. In order that he might live, he also had grasped the pen, and had looked hopefully forward to recognition and distinction. He had been living a long while dissatisfied and miserable; by night he roamed through the streets of the great city like a runaway dog; his desk and seat were the table and bench of the commonest tavern; he frequently sought sleep and oblivion in the most wretched dens, side by side with thieves and the most reprobate of beings, the scum of humanity. Thus had he been thrust about till, all hope being now at an end, he bethought him that dying was perhaps a little better than living. He had looked for a home, and now the great quartermaster, death, had at length assigned him an abode.

Whatever may be thought of this suicide, it is unquestionably the nobler heroism which enables a man to endure, without rest or weariness, to the last. That Jean Paul, in his darkest hours, when crushed to the lowest extremity by the miseries of the world, never lost faith in himself, never listened to the gloomy tempter, but "laughed so long in the face of fortune that it began to smile upon him in return,” this, indeed, commands admiration as a rare and worthy heroism.

He left Leipsic in 1784, and went to live with his mother, in Hof: here he found a night's lodging, at least, free of cost, and here he could go about without being pointed to as a beast broken loose from a menagerie, when he walked the streets without a wig, with open breast, and no neck-tie. In this respect the people of Hof were more tolerant than a certain Leipsic magister, who, probably not remembering how the cynic Diogenes, in tattered garb, had trodden the pride of Plato under foot, had written to the wig less and collarless youth in peremptory

twelve labors. The angry goddess is appeased; on Eta commences the apotheosis of the son of the gods. For Jean Paul, also, the hour strikes when the inexorable forces of destiny at length cry “ Hold!" In the year 1796 the startling story of Hesperos issued from the little washing and spinning chamber; it obtained for its author, in all the states of Germany, that for which he had labored-recognition. "What a god-genius," writes the octogenarian Gleim," is our Friedrich Richter! Here is more than Shakspeare, I say to myself, in more than fifty passages I have underlined. I am perfectly enraptured at the genius from which these streams, these rills, these Rhine-falls, these Blandusian springs issue and irrigate humanity, and if I am displeased to-day at some sentences such as the muses have not inspired, or even with the plan itself, I shall not be so to-morrow."

The fight for existence and recognition is fought out; sunshine breaks through the clouds; henceforth the star of Jean Paul shines brightly in the heavens.

that mind is often bestowed upon those whom in early years the great world ignores!

There are, no doubt, to-day, Mrs. Bantam, in our school-rooms, ragged urchins, whose bare feet hang dangling down, who will be our presidents and congressmen in years to come. The people of this world are upon a great revolving wheel, ever going up to a climax, and their children downward again to the earth; and those of us that would court the rich, must remember that in the next turn of the wheel their descendants will go down, while the masses are all the time coming up. If I had any ambitious motives in courting the favor of the people, I should look out for the bare-footed urchins who walk on unheeded by the gay crowd! If they are properly cared for, they will make men in the future that we shall have no reason to be ashamed of. I am surprised that our prominent people forget this fact; for who are our aristocracy? Twenty years ago this one butchered, that one made candles, another sold cheese and butter, a fourth carried on a distillery, and yet others were in the cod-fish line. They know the ups

Dhe

TABLE.

ID you ever notice, Mrs. Bantam, that there is a natural disposition among mankind to aristocracy? And whether the government is a monarchy or a republic, there will be an aristocratic class of people, who will look to family, dollars, and name as a warrant of nobility. There will be a would-be nobility, whether there be barons, right honorables, lords, or not; a nobility whose greatest support lies under the ground in the graves of meritorious sires. But our Creator, as if to mock and thwart the puerile pretensions of men, has so arranged our earthly condition that there are three prominent gifts that none can monopolize, and which money cannot purchase. There is beauty, which graces many a cottage dweller; there is mind, which often raises to eminence children of the hovel; and there is the power of song, which is more the gift of beggars and negro bondmen, than of those who dwell in marble halls. The prettiest girl of this town is a poor widow's daughter; the most melodious singing I ever heard was at a negro meeting; and everywhere your Websters, Clays, Douglases, and Bankses attest the truth

their children (many of them) will know the same after them. Far too often these earth-worms hatch butterflies, that soon drop their wings. Death brings a division of property, and then a scattering!

I have sometimes wondered, Mrs. Bantam, how small men like Lawyer Jones and Preacher Smith can hold up their heads after delivering themselves of such insignificant speeches and sermons, when there are in the country so many at the bar and in the pulpit who are suns compared with their rushlights. I have seen young preachers come out of the pulpit all aglow with satisfaction over some sermon of theirs, that would have been puny when set beside the preaching of others all around them. I have often wondered how this can be, and have just of late begun to see through it. There is a wise provision that all shall measure their works by the doings of their equals. The school boy who acquits himself so finely on exhibition day, never thinks of Edward Everett, but of his fellow-students. He measures his intellectual strength by that of those around him. It often happens that the school-boy comes down from the platform with more exultant thoughts than ever

swelled the heart of a Webster after the delivery of one of his master-pieces! The young preacher of twenty-two puts a far higher estimate upon his efforts than he will upon the abler sermons of his manhood. And this is well; were it 'otherwise we should get no preaching or speeches of any kind, for a man must be interesting to himself, who would interest others.

It is curious what a great ado people will always make over their children. I would not wonder if most parents expect to have Miltons, Websters, Clays, or Irvings in their families. How eagerly does the mother watch the little prattle of her brood, to see if there be indications of genius. O the wistfulness with which mothers look for the development of pearls and diamonds in the family cluster! I would not, Mrs. Bantam, willingly cast a shade over the hopes of any of you mothers, but I always shake my head when I see a precocious child! How poorly can we tell who, among all the bright little ones, will shine in the world; and generally the successful ones are those of whom we least suspect such things. Does not God, for wise ends, hide all indications of the future, as if to put a veto on the idea of his election or partiality? In our school days, Mrs. Bantam, we knew young men of promise, who seemed to be akin to Byron, to Cooper, to Calhoun. We went out from the scenes of our school days, expecting soon to hear of B. D., and P., G., or F., as editors, as congressmen, as poets, as actors who would shed a luster upon their parentage and their country; we have been looking out wistfully on the heavens for the rising of those new stars; but, alas, no familiar lights appear in the heavens! Their early light has faded; they are passing away into space, we fear, to be forgotten forever!

To-day I remember one such friend, and if the company will permit a sad story, I will recite one. Go on? Well then Once upon a time, when I was young, and hopeful too, I was a member of a city Church, and a youth of twelve years was my dearest friend. Harvey Howell was almost a prodigy; at least I thought him such. He would read his Greek Testament in the Sabbath-school class, and in play-day life would quote poetry from all the poets, from Shakspeare down to the last poetaster of the Literary Budget; and

this all applicable to any incident that might come up. As a young Christian, he was everything that could be wished. Few were more faithful than he.

Har

We were together for two years. vey then went to a country town to attend a seminary. There are always wild young men at such places, and Harvey, being witty and overly wise, was looked up to, was petted, was spoiled!

One year passed, and Harvey returned a different person. He had arrived at those years when passion prevails, and his heart was wandering. He came to class-meeting now and then, to keep up appearances. His speaking was vague enough; often he would quote something sentimental from Byron; yes, Byron in the classroom! His talk was all of desires and good wishes.

In the week-time I was with Harvey much. His once pure and literary mind had become all filled with impure images. Now and then he could rise above the sensual enough to speak sentimentally and rhapsodically of the floating clouds, or the dazzling stars. Two years before, his poetic quotations were merely witty and pleasant; now they were impure. He would quote all the double entendres and innuendoes of all the rakish poets, from Goldsmith to Byron; but Byron was his favorite. He thought as Byron thought; Byron said this; Byron said that. Byron, indeed, was a great poetico-god to whom his impure imagination bowed down in worship! From slip-shod morality he went on to Voltairean witticisms. He always had some biting irony to cast out, in a sneering way, against this remark and that remark of the preacher.

Months passed. He came to church no more. He entered a Catholic college and graduated. He passed a year or two in wild, witty, aimless life, and then fell into the tide that led to the gold land. It was not long until he knew all about drunkenness and gambling!

At last, worn out with the ills of his ill life, he wrote home a pitiful tale. He was sick; had no money; wanted to come home. Indeed, it was the old story, the ever-repeated drama of the prodigal son! O it was pitiful to think of! Harvey, once so beloved; Harvey, once the wit and the scholar; Harvey, once the pet of the Church, the idol of sister and mother; a light to guide other souls toward heaven;