often accompanies great political distinction; and even in the government of his slaves, he was the kindest and most beloved of masters. No man was ever more revered by those who knew him best. And when, as was, however, but seldom his habit, he visited his friends and relatives, it was beautiful to observe the warm, cordial love, with which even the children of their house would greet and caress him. He was a man of the tenderest sensibilities, and of the strongest and most endearing affection. How completely he entwined himself about the hearts of his friends, let the last memorial of the ascetic Randolph attest. He paid back to his friends, however, from the warmth of his own heart, every tribute of affection yielded to him. And, although he did not vaunt himself upon his good deeds, the writer of this article could here, were it necessary, record a long list of charities, ever active, though unostentatious, and munificent, because they were always useful.

AUTUMN.

SWEET summer with her flowers has passed,

I hear her parting knell;

I hear the moaning fitful blast
That brings her sad farewell.

But while she fades and dies away,
In rainbow hues she glows,
Like the last smile of parting day,
Still brightening as it goes.

The robin whistles clear and shrill;
Sad is the cricket's song;

The wind, wild rushing o'er the hill,
Bears the dead leaf along.

I love this sober, solemn time,
This twilight of the year;

To me sweet spring, in all her prime,
Was never half so dear.

While death has set his changing seal

On all that meets the eye,

'Tis rapture then within to feel

The soul that cannot die.

E. L. FOLLEN.

THE CONSTITUTION OAK..

ON a valley's gentle bosom,

In a lovely Western isle,

Which sweetly, o'er Atlantic's waves,

Returns fair Georgia's smile;

Proud o' er its leafy comrades,

To dare the fiercest storm,
As the forest-king, a giant Oak,
Upreared its stately form.

Its branches toward the heavens,
Its roots to the heart of earth,

Towered and sank, like those mammoth growths

Of creation's elder birth.

Such growth as the world knows only

In the young land of the free,

Where it seems to read in these noble forms
What man too there may be.

'Mid the forest's startled echoes,
'Neath the axe's long-plied stroke,
Lo, with a hurtling thunder sound,
Fallen that mighty Oak!

No more it rears its regal head,

Yet, wood-nymph, mourn thou not,

For in freedom's cause, on the free wild waves,
It shall bear a glorious lot!

'Twas a sight to stir the spirit,

And ten thousand hearts beat high,

While from ten thousand voices

A glad shout rent the sky,

As from her yielding fast'nings

Launched forth to the heaving tide,

Floated a noble frigate,

In her beauty and her pride.

The first tree that was felled for the building of the frigate Constitution, was a noble oak, on St. Simon's Island, off the mouth of the Alatamaha river, Georgia. The stump of the tree is a well known object of interest on the spot, by the name of the Constitution Oak. It is stated that the keel of the vessel was laid from that tree. A laurel tree has, by a happy instinct of nature, sprung up out of the hollow centre of the decayed trunk.

Her crew-God ever speed them!—
Columbia's gallant tars;

The flag, above them waving,

Their country's stripes and stars; Her cause, its CONSTITUTION,

-And her name the watchword spokeHer frame from that country's forests, Her keel from the Island Oak.

How fared the gallant vessel,

On her trackless ocean path, When many a fearful hour

Howled the wild tempest's wrath?
Staunch were those massive timbers,
Stout were those hearts and brave,
And a nation's blessing followed her,
As she bounded o'er the wave.

And say, how did she bear her
In the battle's wilder storm,
When the broadside's crashing thunders
Burst from her quivering form?
When from the smoke-cloud's bosom,
That stifled the gasping breath,
Fast flashed its lurid lightnings,
With every gleam a death?

When o'er the dabbled deck,

And down the shattered side,

From many a noble heart

Streamed warm the life-blood's tide;

While still o' er din of shot and stroke
Fierce shouts of battling men
Yet louder rang-oh say, how sped
The gallant vessel then?

Those Stripes-did foeman's hand

E'er lower their proud streaming? Those Stars-did ever cloud of shame Sully their glorious beaming? Answer, her country's annals, On whose brightest page is told, How thrice she humbled the tyrant might Of the Ocean-Queen of old!

Answer, the shouts of welcome,

That rang o'er shore and sea,
When thrice she sought her haven
In her pride of victory!

Answer, the thrill which still can warm,
With a glow of patriot flame,

A nation's heart when the tale is told
Of the "Constitution's" fame!

Many a year has circled

In peace o'er that fair land,
And Freedom hath her blessings there
Showered with bounteous hand,

Since died the last dull echo

Of the battle-thundering gun,

And our liberty's last struggle

On land and sea was won.

Old Ironsides yet nobly

Her flag bears o'er the main,

-Oh, ne'er o'er scene of strife and blood, May those bright folds wave again!

But should another foe assail

Her country's rights and laws,
She'll bear it still as gloriously,
In the same glorious cause.

And now, on that valley's bosom,
If your step would seek the spot
Where the old gray stump is mouldering,
Of that Oak-'tis not forgot.
Right up from out its aged heart
Behold! will greet your eye
A brave young Laurel, gallantly
Springing towards the sky.

No hand of man hath ever

Planted that Laurel there,

But the wild wind bore the glorious germ

Free through the pathless air.

And oh, ever be bright that dark green leaf, Which thus from that dead trunk broke, To wreathe with a fadeless crown of fame The old Constitution Oak!

THE TOLL-GATHERER'S DAY,

A SKETCH

OF

TRANSITORY LIFE.

By the Author of "Twice-told Tales."

METHINKS, for a person whose instinct bids him rather to pore over the current of life, than to plunge into its tumultuous waves, no undesirable retreat were a toll-house beside some thronged thoroughfare of the land. In youth, perhaps, it is good for the observer to run about the earth-to leave the track of his footsteps far and wide-to mingle himself with the action of numberless vicissitudes --and finally, in some calm solitude, to feed a musing spirit on all that he has seen and felt. But there are natures too indolent, or too sensitive, to endure the dust, the sunshine, or the rain, the turmoil of moral and physical elements, to which all the wayfarers of the world expose themselves. For such a man, how pleasant a miracle, could life be made to roll its variegated length by the threshold of his own hermitage, and the great globe, as it were, perform its revolutions and shift its thousand scenes before his eyes without whirling him onward in its course. If any mortal be favored with a lot analogous to this, it is the toll-gatherer. So, at least, have I often fancied, while lounging on a bench at the door of a small square edifice which stands between shore and shore in the midst of a long bridge. Beneath the timbers ebbs and flows an arm of the sea; while above, like the life-blood through a great artery, the travel of the north and east is continually throbbing. Sitting on the aforesaid bench, I amuse myself with a conception, illustrated by numerous pencil-sketches in the air, of the toll-gatherer's day.

In the morning-dim, gray, dewy summer's morn-the distant roll of ponderous wheels begins to mingle with my old friend's slumbers, creaking more and more harshly through the midst of his dream, and gradually replacing it with realities. Hardly conscious of the change from sleep to wakefulness, he finds himself partly clad and throwing wide the toll-gates for the passage of a fragrant load of hay. The timbers groan beneath the slow-revolving wheels; one sturdy yeoman stalks beside the oxen, and peering from the summit of the hay, by the glimmer of the half-extinguished lantern over the toll-house, is seen the drowsy visage of his comrade, who has enjoyed a nap some ten miles long. The toll is paid-creak, creak, again go the wheels, and the huge hay-mow vanishes into the morning mist. As yet, nature is but half awake, and familiar objects appear visionary. But yonder, dashing from the shore with a rattling thunder of the wheels and a confused clatter of hoofs,