+ ~ -
 
Please report pronunciation problems here. Select and sample other voices. Options Pause Play
 
Report an Error
Go!
 
Go!
 
TOC
 

collection of mattercenturies oldand the
health of Bulferry requires that this should
be lanced frequently, and subjected to
pressure.

FROM GOLD TO GRAY.

GOLDEN curls, profusely shed
O'er the lovely childish head,—
Sunshine, caught from summer skies,
Surely here entangled lies:
Tossing to the light winds free,
Radiant clusters, what are ye?

Types of Time that ripples now
In bright wavelets o'er the brow,—
Of the hopes and feelings blest
Dancing in the guileless breast,
Beautiful in their unrest:
Sparkling joys and willing faith
Rising to Love's lightest breath;—
Of the future, seeming fair,
That may darken with the hair.

What are ye, dark waving bands
That, beneath the maiden's hands,
Sweep around her graceful head?
Fold o'er fold of changeful shade
Touch the cheek's contrasted bloom
With the poetry of gloom.

Offerings for a lover's eye;
Emblems of Love's witchery,
Round her heart that richly lies,—
Shadows, while it beautifies;
Keepsakes Love delights to give.
Did each friend one tress receive,
Every shining tress were lost,
For the maiden hath a host.
Ay! but trouble, stories say,
Locks as rich hath worn away.
What of this? But friends grew spare
As the scant and falling hair!

Wherefore send your pallid ray,
Streaks of cold, untimely gray,
Through the locks whose burnish'd hue
Hath but seen of years a few?
Autumn leaves on summer trees
Were less sorrowful than these.

Portions of life's travel-soil;
Footprints left by Grief and Toil;
Relics, too, of watchings late,
When one curl was too much weight
On the hot brows, bending o'er
Some grave book of ancient lore.
'Tis the mourning Nature wears
For the hopes of younger years;
And the scorching breath of care
Thus can fade the brightest hair.

Hail to thee, thou glistening snow!
Full of placid beauty, flow
O'er the furrowed brows that bear
Life's long story, written fair.
'Tis the white foam, cast aside
After Time's receding tide.

Yea, and pleasant types are ye
Of each moonlight memory;
Shining from his far-off prime
To the old man's evening time.
Moreye are reflections shed
From the heaven above his head;
Pale, but still assuring ray,
Of his nearly risen day.
Mortal! may thy hoary hair
E'en such glorious meaning bear,
That its silver threads may be
Messengers of light to thee!

CHIPS.
A GREAT CATCH.

A CORNISH correspondent, alluding to the
statement, at page 598, of our fourth volume,
that last summer, in Mount's Bay, as many
pilchards were enclosed at one time, in one
net, as fetched twelve thousand pounds,
declares, that " The Seine, or Catch, alluded to
was 'shot' at St. Ives, and not in Mount's Bay.
The number of pilchards supposed to have
been enclosed in the net was sixteen million,
five hundred thousand; or five thousand, five
hundred hogsheads, weighing eleven hundred
tons. The probable value was eleven thousand
pounds, reckoning them at the usual price of
two pounds per hogshead, before deducting
expense of curing."

Yet, despite such wonderful resources of
the sea (which were detailed more fully in
previous articles in this miscellany *),
hundreds of personsaccording to the last Report
of the Registrar-General of Deaths, &c.—die
yearly in England and Wales for the want
of food; while in Ireland, death from starvation
is much more frequent. At the same
time, tons of wholesome food is perpetually
swimming about, within reach of starving
people, and yet they do not catch it.
* Vol. i., p. 217, "A Popular Delusion;" and vol. iii,
p. 421, " Fish Dinners.''

A PRIMITIVE PEOPLE.

THE history of Transylvania is, perhaps,
one of the wildest and most romantic that
ever told the story of a nation. It describes
a people perfectly primitive and pastoral, and
living under institutions as patriarchal as
those existing at the time of Lot or Abraham.
Transylvania, long annexed to the
Austrian monarchy, was in old times looked
upon as the rightful prize of the strong hand;
and was, by turns, seized and plundered by
Turks, Austrians, and Hungarians. For a
short time it chose its own princes, who
aspired to be kings of Hungary. Their
presumption met with the penalty of utter
annihilation.

To understand these peasants properly, the
reader may, perhaps, be allowed to compare
them to the Highland clansmen of Scotland
at the same period. Far before any authentic
records, a people have dwelt in Transylvania,
who knew nothing beyond the deep valleys