nations joining; and now, that they had been the occasion of firing the town. This report did so terrify, that on a sudden there was such an uproar and tumult that they ran from their goods, and taking what weapons they could come at, they could not be easily stopped from falling on some of those nations whom they casually met, without sense or reason. The clamour and peril grew so excessive that it made the whole Court amazed, and they did with infinite pains and great difficulty reduce and appease the people, sending troops of soldiers and guards to cause them to retire into the fields again, where they were watched all this night. I left them pretty quiet, and came home sufficiently weary and broken. Their spirits thus a little calmed, and the affright abated, they now began to repair into the suburbs about the city, where such as had friends or opportunity got shelter for the present, to which his Majesty's proclamation also invited them. graff, a ditch. arch'itrave, the main beam of a building, over the front pillars. SPELL AND PRONOUNCE projec'târe, a projec- vora'goes, gulfs, deep det'riment, injury. surheat'ed, overheated. destitu'tion, want. cas'ually, by chance. HOME, SWEET HOME.-PAYNE. 'MID pleasures and palaces though we may roam, Which, sought through the world, is ne'er met with elsewhere. There's no place like home! I gaze on the moon as I trace the drear wild, And I feel that my parents now think of their child. There's no place like home! An exile from home, splendour dazzles in vain ; There's no place like home! THE LAND OF MY BIRTH. THERE's a magical tie to the land of our home, Which the heart cannot break, though the footsteps may roam : Be that land where it may, at the Line or the Pole, It still holds the magnet that draws back the soul. "Tis loved by the freeman, 'tis loved by the slave; "Tis dear to the coward, more dear to the brave; Ask of any the spot they like best upon earth, And they'll answer with pride, ""Tis the land of my birth." Oh, England! thy white cliffs are dearer to me Did I breathe in a clime where the bulbul is heard, My country, I love thee: though freely I'd rove mag'net, loadstone, at tracting power. gar land, to adorn with flowers. peer, to equal, to be com pared with. SPELL AND PRONOUNCE bul'bul, Persian name savan'nah, the name given in America to large plains on the banks of rivers, in forests, &c. gondolier', a boat-rower of Venice, THE SIERRA NEVADA.'-PLAYER FROWD. 1. I LEFT Lake Tahoa2 and its comfortable inn with regret. One could spend a month there most delightfully. The most picturesque scenery; excursions in all directions; shooting, from grizzly bear to the mountain quail; lake fishing and river fishing; mining, if that may be called an amusement; in short, the perfect enjoyment of purely natural scenery. 2. Of course the mode of locomotion must be either on foot or on horseback, and the latter with the Californian saddle. An English saddle is all very well on a smooth road, or when crossing the plains; but when you have to go down ravines or up hills at an angle of forty-five degrees,3 the high peak fore and aft is not only a comfort but a necessity. I remember the distress of one obstinate Briton, who persisted in retaining his English pig-skin. At one time he was clinging for dear life to his horse's mane, at another his horse was being nearly thrown down by all the weight being on his shoulders. 3. And yet the first experience of a Californian saddle is any. thing but agreeable. The great wooden stirrups hang far back, the body is bifurcated between two upright wooden saddle-trees or peaks, like those in a dragoon saddle, only nearer to one another. There is no possibility of that easy lounge backward that we can indulge in at home, and, for the first day or two, the stranger finds the native saddle excessively fatiguing. 4. Once, however, see a cow-herd, lasso in hand, in full chase of a wild ox; see him throw the noose over the animal's horns, and notice how the horse, the moment it feels the jerk, plants its forefeet whilst the lariat is wound round the peak of the pommel, and then you will understand the use of a Californian saddle. The girths are also different from ours, and the proper adjustment of the equipment takes a long time to acquire properly. The Mexican saddle differs slightly from the native Californian, each being adapted to the peculiarities of the country; and I have been informed that the saddle in use in the Argentine Provinces1 differs again from either of these, and for the purpose of hunting or herding cattle is superior. 5. I have often remarked in California that the mules had one girth tightly strapped round the forepart of the belly, and another as near the hind legs as possible, and not, as in our system, across the middle. This, especially with pack mules, prevents the load slipping, though to a stranger at first sight it gives the idea of compression, amounting to cruelty; but the animal does not appear to suffer. 6. Once more in the train, and, during the next fourteen miles, we ascend nearly twelve hundred feet. Two immensely powerful engines perform the arduous task, until at length we reach Summit Station,5 seven thousand and seventeen feet above the sea, and only two hundred and forty miles from San Francisco. Here we pass through a railroad construction peculiar to the Central Pacific line; I mean the snow-sheds. 6 7. Let the reader picture to himself a long gallery composed of immensely strong uprights of timber and great joists of pine wood, the whole arched, Gothic fashion, with here and there small openings, through which a glorious panorama is seen for an instant as the train roars its way along. Let him fancy these in winter, when the storm-king reigns among the Sierras, when the swift snow-drifts come like avalanches down the sides of the mountains, and these massive wooden shields groan, and creak, and bend under the weight of the superincumbent snow, as the mighty wind drives it over the roof; and fancy the great, screeching engines, with the line of carriages attached, thundering through all this, and rivalling the roar of the elements outside, and then he will understand the grandeur of peril as well as the might of engineering skill to remedy it. 8. But it is not only the storm element that is to be dreaded in these snow galleries. A burning coal from the engine, a careless watchman, or, worse still, the torch of the incendiary, will easily set fire to the resinous pine timber. The nature of the arched sheds creates a draft, the wind sweeps in as to a furnace, and there is the roaring of great flames, until the whole is consumed. Suppose that the fire begins in the centre. The switchman, only intent upon watching for the coming train, signals "all right," in it dashes, and the newspapers chronicle "awful catastrophe at the snow-sheds." It is exceedingly uncomfortable to be stopped at one of these snow-sheds, as sometimes happens, and to have to wait twelve hours, or more, at the top of the Sierra Nevada, until the damage is repaired, or another train arrives from the other side. 9. But the summit is passed, and all the rivers and streams flow westward. In six miles we have descended five hundred feet. The pace is awful; but the scenery, fitfully snatched from the mouths of tunnels, or on emerging from deep cuttings, is grand in the extreme. We round Cape Horn, as it is called; we are shown the head waters of the American river,' more than two hundred miles from its mouth; we wind our way through the Giant's Gap, through the deep Bloomer Cut; we go across Placer County, El Dorado County, Gold Run, Emigrant Gap, all speaking of the land of promise we were fast approaching. Ever descending the valley of the Sacramento, which, at Auburn, is only thirteen hundred feet high, we at length cross the bridge over the American river, and in three miles more are in Sacramento.8 HONOUR and shame from no condition rise; |